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March 1989

jO Un®**

John P***® *!!*

The official magazine for all users of the Ams

In^d's Back

Netherworld

Zealand NZ$4.9S Sec.

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SPECTRUM

AMSTRAD

SPECTRUM AMSTRAD ATARI ST CBjalS

SPECTRUM’ COMMODORE ATARI ST CBMAMieA

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oloctronic

Four years' continual development have made MicroLink into
the COMPLETE communications and information system for
everyone with a home or business computer.

And it's so easy to use. From your keyboard, linked to a
modem and phone, you can directly key into the services
provided by Telecom Gold — and many, many more.

Every day thousands of electronic mail messages pass between
MicroLink subscribers throughout Britain . . . and many other parts of the
world. From their keyboard they can also send telex and fax messages,
without the need to buy expensive equipment.

MicroLink can be used with ANY computer, from a tiny hand-held
Psion Organiser or Z88 portable to the most sophisticated computer
of all. And from anywhere where there is a telephone point.

One number to dial ...
one SMurfty password ...
one simple log-on ...

So if you want to speed up your mail, tap into a weather satellite,
carry out company searches, obtain free legal and financial advice,
order flowers, book theatre tickets, negotiate a mortgage, help
yourself to free telesoftware programs - or go adventuring in the
land of Shades, the world's biggest multi-user game — then there's
only one answer - MicroLink.

and you're only a
keystroke away from
the best information
and entertainment
services now available!

FIND OUT MORE ABOUT HTIkfOLiDK

Please send me Name.

Address

j more facts about

! fHicfoUDK

Send to: MicroUnK Evrop» House, Adtingtan Park. Adfington, Macclesfiald SKW 4NP, ACU 3

cocc* tor 3 nnontt'’

sernl Sh FREF ffigisifatKSi

niaiteoi«- So vo ^ b penfif

' The tKcJ

□igphonfl.

The official maga?ino fof
Amstrad CPC users

REGULARS

Applications

Advice

David Foster with more
manic mutterings on
making it work.

setters

Lance gives the postbag a
shake and a lorra lorra
letters fall out.

Hairy Hackers

Vax bends the rule
with hacks for
one and all.

Editorial and Advartising offices:

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Hasifngs, EasJ Sussex Ti^35 4NB.
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Editor: Simof) Rockman
Assistant Editor: Jeff Walker
Advertisement Manager: Ctare Baxter
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Production Manager: Nick Fry
Production: Tanya Al-Hais
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Chief Executive: Richard Hease
Subscriptions to: Mike Mckenzie^

PO Box 74^ Tunbridge^
Kent. T1V12 6DW

Amstrad is s re^fstered trade mark, and witd Ihe
dtif Amspjad Compin;^r User in used tde
pefmisBfart of Ar77strad pic. part of this

de fitodused wftdout permisstpn
While eve^ a^ort is made t£i erasure f/ii? acwtffcy
oi aif hatures and itsUngs cannot accept any
liahiiiiy for sny misWes Of ntisprinis. The y/eiv^
and aptmaf?s exprassed are not neeassarify those of
Amsttsd or Anysofi tut represar^t ths v\e\AfS of our
many readers, users, end contrihototS- fi^eteriai for
pubif'catforr is only accepted oji an aii-righis basis.

144? regret l.hjt Amstrad Computer User oertnoi
enter into per^oriai correapondenoe.

Puhifsheti for Pocus Mec^e^inet? lid by the
Europress Group

Tab^

Jaf*-Juhif 1367

You've never seen a games
section tike it - 11 pages of
pure gold featuring the very
latest on the games software
scene and 18 too hot to
handle reviews. Be there, or
be square.

■yWAD PETI
The petitif*

Mhat gtipw
It ua* to

PROGRAMMING

Simon Watson shows you
how to use his utility to
create your animations.

Ian Sharpe takes a trip to
the bank manager.

The lowdown on how to
put the squeeze on
screens.

All things come to those
who wait. Happy now?

Type in and solve this
variation on the sliding
block puzzle.

COVER STORY

Phil Craven returns with a
project that'll help turn
your 464 into a 6128.

FEATURES

Dave Dorn tries to beat the
bookies with DGA's fllty
■forecaster.

Suburban acrobatic birds
often found on page three
(4).

Us&r M^rch 1939

Page 5

Iwn Lofd^ s 4rf$

s&t m s

wortd where strategy ts a$
imperUnt as strength. Out
mkt-summet at £t2.3B tape,
m.9Bdisc

Eter^Tom'c es^epe-
ftom-the^nasty-rnaie
game, Puffy's Saga.
Should be reedy ruund
abofit August priced at
ms tape. £14 99 disc

. L lit ' '^-■

, .. , ... ,

Page 6

Amstr^d U$^r M^rch 1989

Spianuh codeit Btsckbt^f^ tin first otiginBi CPC game oa the Kba 1^.
Out mw priced f2.39 oa tape

L isten 'ers me
hearties. Kixir has
re}eased its first
erishal CPC release,
Btackbeafd. Coded m Sfuin
- heharr, Joen lad - by
Carlos Arias, the game is
played on board Vic-
tory, which is now under the
captaincy of the ruthless
Re(fi>eard - the scurvy dog -
who hes waylaid your treas^
ure map and stowed it in a
chest somewhere deep in
the bowels of his ship.

Yo ho ho ho and a bottle
of bullfighters, we hear you
cry. Pieces of octal, pieces of
octal, we reply. £2.99 worth,
in fact. Reidew next motrth.
Hiccup. Cordon Bennet,
thish rum Ish shtrong shtuff.

|i 9 R-Tvpe. Death Stalker

@ —- - -'

% to Corruption, Solar Warrior

M _—

13 Ingrid's Back, Pacmama

14 Roy of the Rovers, Tiger
Road

a 17 Peter Fackrat.

Netherworld

18 Galactic Conqueror,

Victory Ro&d

20 Gi Hero, A Simple Case
of Espionage

seems like a nice boy - and
move on to the explosive
climax! Rembo is back in
Rambo tit. Who does he think he
is, Roclty?

~ whoops, there goes another
plot - end there is only one
person capable of freeing him.
Negotiate the minefields,
explore the Russian camp - he

H e is back, and this time
he's taking no pris¬
oners. Colonel Treut-
man has been captured
by the Russians in Afghanistan

23 Echelon, Ancient Bottles

24 operation Hormuz,

Coped Crusader

TO B

i LET R:

SiteakY preview screen shot ot Cftui* Yeege/i Advanced flipM Trainer.
Fuft review next month. D^ndety

ffiunderhlladi

USGoU

£9.S9

Siiverbitd goes poster mad with a £t.5S siidktq
picture puzzle, RssreniaoFer

J^PinbaNSimufatof

CDcte Matfisf;

£ig»

Amstfctd User1989

[ _ t

1 1

Be Hqs &een “Pib slsl

"Three excellent games..,the adventure bargain of the
year" — Your AitiigBj June 88.

"Each is a classic - so buy it". - ST Update, July 88.

Ptease tick the format you require.

□ I enclose a chieQue for £_(includmg VAT

and p&pl made payable to Mandarin Software

□ Please debit my AccessA^isa card no:

Signature.

Name_

Address—

Tape versions come with three
cassettes in every package

Postcode.

SfiVD TO'- Mandarin Software, Europa Housa,
Adlingtor Parti, Adlington, Macclesfield SKIO 4IVP.

R2S2

bUL Master (Qu treckr > Text only

Dealers: Ring Diane O'Brien on 0625 878888 for
your free Mandariti Software information oack

SOFT WA R E

The trilogy

Interactive fiction
from 1 n

T hree of Level 3's most acclaimed adven¬
tures - Lords of Time, Red Moon and The
Price of Magik - come together in one
package- Each has been enhanced and enlarged
with more text than ever before ^ €0,000 mind¬
expanding words creating magik and mysterv
round every corner. There's a powerful new
parser, and most disc versions include stunning
digitised pictures that help to dramatically
heighten the atmosphere.

>f If ■ i naif M lilt HTir3i Ita I Ih if W k
yiii iwe I Ik nui tl If HiiBHlI. no iB Mfi a
ini ill 1 utif it ^ <11» A a ly ^
biifj

Screen shots from
4 far/ ST

£14.95

Tape

Disc

Spectmm 48k/12ak

Commodore ■64/128

Am stead CPC

Amstrad CPC, PCW,
Speclrurn Plus 3

Atari XUXE*

MSX 64k

Apple ir

BBC Master (SO trpckf

£19.95

Disc

Atari ST

Comnnodore Amiga

Amstrad PC and

PC compatibles

Macintosh

W HY are aliens always so
nasiy? Why don't they
just try to be friends
instead of invading ali
the time? In ft-Type the aliens are
the evil By do Empire, and a more
horrible race of afiens you couldn't
hope to find.

The game starts, and you guide
your R-S fighter through the
smootttly scrolling landscape in the
tradition of the classic Scramble
arcade game.

The aliens soon attack, keeping
formation dependant on their ty|>e.
You soon recognise orte and predict
its movement - although knowing
when it is going to shoot doesn't

that bounce around killing anything
in their path and ground lasers
which crawl over the surface.

When you have collected all these,
and also have The Force flying next
to you, every time you shoot the
entire screen is taken up with
enough firepower to destroy a small
planet.

Somehow the aliens wifi always
manage to get you, and when you
get to the huge rotating ring of
armed alien things, you'll need
everything you can fire to stand a
chance. K you survive the ring you
will rneet ^e most revolting alien
you have ever seen. To kill this one
you must... no, it's just too horribie
to describe.

R-Type is based on the arcade
game of the same name, and a
darned good conversion it is too. At
the start ypu are given five credits.
Every time your game ends you can
use one credit to continue from

where you left off an idea taken
from the arcade version, and a
stroke of genius.

The graphics are detailed Mode 1
and quite large, if not exactly
colourful. The aliens look just so...
well, alien. And the larger multi-
segmented ones move around very
fast

The programming is excellent, the
gameplay is superb and with several
stages to load from tape fi-Type wilt
keep you busy for a long time.

necessarily make things any easier.

Shooting at them isn't just a
matter of hitting the right button - in
R-Type, the longer the fire button is
held down determines how pow¬
erful the eventual shot will be. Firing
a powerful energy bolt will kill
several aliens at once.

Some dead aliens will leave a gem
for you to collect. This is where the
fun really starts. Picking up the gems
will arm your ship with all sorts of
exciting weapons.

The first gem will give you The
Force - a separate spaceship that
will follow you, or attach itself to
your front or rear, effectively doub¬
ling your firepower. Later gems will
provide homing missiles to destroy
enemy installations, reflection lasers

0«ve]op#r: In hpuM
Tape: ^.99
Disc; ei4.99

fighter or a well armoured helicopter
gunship.

The action takes place on a
number of levels against an ever-
increasing array of enemy fighters
and ship and ground-based mis¬
siles. Points are scored for enemy
fighters and anti-aircraft turrets de¬
stroyed and for the completion of
each stage.

The range of weapons available to
you also varies with the level. In
addition you possess one smart mis¬
sile in each of your six lives. This is
capable of destroying everything on
the screen, including enemy bullets,
and so is useful in tight situations.

Initial impressions are likely to be
misleading, The first level action is
mundane to say the least. However
it is worth persevering because the
pace soon hots up and should prove
difficult enough to stretch even the
most practised of players,

The graphics are detailed
although the single colour presenta¬

tion does tend to become a bit
monotonous. The sound effects are
nothing special either.

On the 464 and 664 Typhoon is a
multi-load game. This does tend to
break up the action, particularly if
you get wiped out quickly and are
constarttly reloading level one. Each
level, however, is soon taken aboard
so the delays have been kept within
acceptable limits.

O NCE upon a time amuse¬
ment arcades were pieces
that you went to on a wet
Sunday at Margate. They
were filled with mysterious
machines of gothic design in
battered wooden cases that sent
metal balls whirling and spinning at
the flick of a lever and dispensed
bubble gum to the lucky winners.

These machines were operated by
a swarm of grubby faced, lovable
cockney urchins In baggy shorts and
Fairisle pullovers who accosted
unwary adults with their traditional
cry of "Gi's a tanner, mister". The
arcades were places of innocent,
unsophisticated entertainment,
These days you need a PhD in
computer science before you set
foot in one. Brightly lit machines
crammed with more technical wizar¬
dry than your average space shuttle
dispense noisy death and destruc-

Amstr^d UserMarc/') J339

tion at all angles with ruthless
efficiency.

Youngsters with more kills to their
names than Von Richtofen play key¬
pads with the skill and dexterity of a
concert pianist, while anyone over
the age of 21 feels more out of place
than Quasimodo in a Mr Universe
contest Which is a shame because a
lot of the games are jolly good fun.

The recent trend for porting the
best of the arcade games on to
home computers Is therefore a good
thing, enabimg kids of a more
advanced age to make complete
Idiots of themselves in the safety
and comfort of their own homes.

Some of the best of the arcade
games are produced by Konami,
Now Imagine Software has
produced a home version of
Typhoon, a Konami favourite, TTtSs is
an air-sea combat simulation which
puts you in control of either a jet

Developer: Steve lamb.
Tepe: £8.9S I

Disc; £14.95 /

SOLAR

WARRI(

M any years ago at the
start of the 25th century
- I missed that.., must
have overslept - the
Solar Warriors protected Earth and
all its baubies and trinkets by
spreading them around the known
universe. It is now the year 2650 and
the focation of all the goodies Is the
worst kept secret in the Solar
System,

For reasons untold but pretty
important to the pJot; you are the
only Solar Warrior left. You must
zoom around all the planets to de-
inf est them of the bad guys, who are
bent or> treasure theft and general
shoot-'em-up mayhem,
first mission: A choice of Pluto or
Mars, The colourful enemy craft
scroll in from the right, ducking,
weaving, blasting and generally
trying to relieve you of one of your
six lives, A gentle hint of things to
come.

Automatic docking with the moth¬
ership and a few seconds to get your
breath back before stage two, the
descent to the p lartet. A stra nge a nii ■
gravity side-slipping motion is used
here. If you don't land gently, aitd in
the right place, it's...

A tricky manoeuvre, but if you are
the one at parties who can balance a
jelly on a broomstick while coming
down the staircase on roller skates
you will do well here.

Once safely on the surface you
blossom out of the landing craft Into

a vehicle that owes its ancestry to a
tank, a high-speed train ai>d a
spacehopper..With this you trundle
left and right through the scrolling
planetscape. The surface undulates
- if you come to a pothole too wide
to drive over, a wiggle on the joy¬
stick and your craft bdunces across.

With radar scrolling below to tell
you where the bad guys are and a
wary eye for potholes, you shoot
left, right and upwards at the same
time. There are points for shooting
everything that moves.

Ortoe the enemy are all sminerr,
it's back to the menu to choose
another planet and the same again,
only this time a bit harder.

Mars is protected by more fighters
than Pluto. They are more vicious,

but predictable. After jelly-on-a-
broomstick time, the landscape of
Mars appears, redder and bumpier,
with a lovely brand of multiplying
ball out to get you.

Complete Mars and you've fin¬
ished the first mission. Now it's off
to visit Venus - lovely architecture,
nasty surface-and tine pace is really
hotting up,

Venus was a devil. So was the
thing with the odd name. By teatime
I didn't wartt any tea. Just one more
wave, please. Liz says the attack
waves are too predictable, but that is
what makes it playable for me -
knowing where to skulk off and hide
to avoid being, aarghhh, xrft-
pitxxxxed.

Graphically it's no Rembrandt, but

the use of colour, particuiariy on the
planets, is doirie tastefully. The land¬
ing sequence, although strange, is a
refreshing challenge. The move¬
ment of the land buggy is done well,
with its suspension and bouncing
motion a pleasant change from the
anywhere as long as it's sideways
feel of many scrolling games.

Oevetoper:
Dptimus Software.
Tape: £9.9S
Disc: f14.S$

CORRUPTION

A ll you know is that your
name Is Derek Rogers, a
financial whiz in the City,
You have accepted an
offer of partnership from David
Rogers, no relation, who runs a well
known finance house.

The fob seems almost too good to
be true, you just love your new
BMW with its built-in everything. In
the office your secretary Is not
exactly talkative and you do not
even have your own phone. As the
firm is soon moving to new prem¬
ises, you are initietly not that
worried.

Soon little things begin to worry
you. There is tafk of the Fraud
Squad; you are excluded from a
meeting between David and the
company's legal adviser.

As you look around the building,
the feeling of unease grows with
the discovery of a very large cheque
made out to a wanted Cfiminal.

Two attempts ort your life end
being framed for insider dealing are
not your only worries. Is it more
than a coincidence that you end
your new partner are both D.
Rogers?

While there is plenty to explore,
the crux of Corruption is timing and
character interaction. Each
command causes one minute to
pass. Characters move around and
must be questioned for you to learn
something of interest.

The packaging contains useful
information in the form of sheets
from a personai organiser, the
usual Magnetic Scrolls coded hints.

plus an audio cassette. The latter is
a good example of how an innocent
conversation rnay be used against
you.

Graphics are good and concerr-
trate on people rather than scenery.

Corruption is not an easy game to
solve. Without sensible help some
less than expert players may find it
difficult to continue past the first
few hours.

Magnetic Scrclla.
Disc: EtS.SS
orily.

Psge W

Amstrad User March 1989

THE OFFICIAL AMSTRAD USER CLUB

When you buy a
whole new Amstrad system^
why use only half
of it's potential?

1. 12 Issues of the Official Amstrad Magazine.

2. FREE access to our superb CPC Technical
Support Service.

3. Discounted Software ... best prices in the U.Kl

4. Monthly Amdata CPC Newsletter.

5. 24h r Ordering Serv ice.

6. Welcome Pack.

7. Introductory Gift if you join TODAY!

(worth between £3 - £7)

A Message from Amstrad's Chairman.

Dear Amstrad Computer User,

y ou don t need me ro remtnd you that you have selected
the best computer in it's price range. Numerous/ourn'
si/'sts from the ^eciaiist press have now contributed to
the opinion that Amstrad computers represent the best
ai!-round machine you can buy.

One of the many reasons vthy computer joumaiists have
received our products so enthusiasticaHy is undoubtedly
our carefui attention fo providing information on the
system arrd it's software.

You can be a part of Amstrad's ongoing effort to inform
and h^p users by taking advantage of this opportunity

to join the User Ciub. Catering only for the Amstrad
computer user, thk speciaiist support ciub was initiaiiy
formed by Amstrad solely for the purpose of assisting
you with ai! your computer needs.

There are many immediate and direct benefits avaiiable,
so don't delay before fiUing out the application form
beiowand sending it back to Amsoft.

Yours since rely.

Aian Sugar

Chairman AMSTRAD Pic

^TMt DFFhClAi AMETRADU^n TMAfL QHOfE.*Jt£nF4F££ HQLiSEpPDOCK io^RQTin STREET. PAJLllCNNI IHDUETH lAl ESTATEJsUNK IILiT^ f>tSN:

Jjza How Lid., iradtnfl as the Amatrad Uwr Club and Amaoft Mall Order undsr exduBiva liosnca from Amstrad pl-c 1

A HOW TO JOiN THE CLUB A

Simply fln Hi Ihi Coupon and ivtum
i| ic US ai ihio addrost mown logiihef wlvi your
f« mrttjfice. Wsll HndyoiiyourtxciLf^vt
membersNp discount card, i 'W«lcon»P»ck' ind
yourFREElnttoduclory QltL

Y(t I ™n1 to a nfov Iha bsnefit! of Ain*1»*(l Usar Ciu b WamSerHi ip • Pr«ia *nnjt m? today.

I entlfi »f cbaiua/P. 0.1 ar f Z4.a5 paViiltle toAMSOFTWAIlOHDER wdltlit fliy credit tiril

Amstrad User March W89

Page 11

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Page T2

Amstracf User March 1989

PACMANIA

game star - the character whq ooce
haunted 1,000 monitors and ban¬
ished Coronation Street from family
TV screens the length and breadth of
this fair land? What about Pac- Man?

The answer is simple. He becomes
three-dimensionat and learns to
bounce.

In this new version of an old
favourite you have to guide Pac-Man
through the 30 maze worlds of Blocic
Town, PacrMan's Park, Sand Box
Land and JungJy Steps. Your aim is
to eat all the dots and power pills
while avoiding the usual retinue of
ghosts,

To make things more difficult,
there are now two new ghosts to
contend with, spookily named Sue
and Funky.

Eating a power pill makes the
ghosts temporarily change colour,
allowing Pac-Man to gobble them
up and earn extra points.

The green pills - which in the CPC
version are the same colour as

everything else but are conveniently
labelled G - also give you a
temporary speed boost.

The red power pills - that's R to us
- award double points. Odd items of
fruit which addhonus points to your
score appear from time to time.

Pacmania is uncompficated and
can be played at a number of levels
of diffcully - truly otre for all the
family. Add to this the snappy tune
and the good graphics, and you
have a game that is both eyecatch¬
ing and fun to play.

and tal^ notice?

Well, ageing rock stars suddenly
discover true commitment and
involve themselves in high profile
projects to "Save the Platypus". But
what about the fading computer

H OW do you revive a
legend? How do you inject
a dose of that certain
something into a megastar
whose time has been and gone?
How can you make Joe Public sit up

I NGRID'S story first started in
Gnome Ranger, after she had
completed her education at the
Institute of Gnome Economics.
She is a well-meaning gnome who
strives to better not prrly herself but
those around her as well.

Her Ideas were sound, but nearly
all of her efforts ended in disaster.
Her progressive attitude jarred with
her traditional gnomic family.

Having her around finally became
too much; they gave her a magic
scroll which "accidentally" trans¬
ported her far, far away. Ingrid's
journey home in Gnome Ranger
gave us an adventure that was both
amusing and devious.

Ingrid's Back begins shortly after
her return. While the family is still
trying to friink of ways to get Ingrid
out of their hair, local events
overtake them.

There is a move afoot to transform
little Moaning and the Dribble
Valley into a Yuppie Homes devel¬
opment. Jasper Quick buck, the lord
of Ridley's Manor, is the prime
mover in this money-grabbing
scheme, abetted by his henchman
Silas Crawley.

The villagers have been conned
into going to a party, thereby vacat¬
ing their homes and apparently
agreeing to the development Need¬
less to say. Ingrid is at the forefront
of the battle to save the day.

The adventure is divided into
three parts, all of which can be
played independently, in the first,
fngrid must get all the locals to sign
a petition.

Not everyone likes to be around
when Ingrid is busy at something,
and a certain amount of subterfuge
will be necessary to get some of the
signatures. The oniy creature that
really trusts her is flopsy the dog.

be a willirrg conspirator.
The text is highly de-
scriptive. It maintains
the right atmosphere

Is ofteiiY ye^

amusing. There
are plenty of quality
} graphics. The com-

interpreter is similar
to that used in Lancelot -
. in many ways belter, and

certbiniy easier to use, than
that used by Magnetic Scrolls,

The flow of play is not restricted
for slow typists because generally
only the first four letters of a word
need to be entered, The use of the
arrow keys will bring back com¬
mands issued earlier, to be used
again or for editing,

Ingrid's Back also makes use of
Level 9's go lo and run to com¬
mands so that once you have

Part two brings back
memories of
Hitchhikers. Silas,
armed with 0 m
steamroller and
several trolls, seta^v
out to steal the
deeds of Ingrid's ▼
home, Gnettiefield ^

Farm. Ir^grid,

again witii Fiopsy's

help, must immobilise both the

steamroller and the trolls, trying not

to destroy her family in the process.

Having drawn a temporary halt to
Jasper's plans, a final solution must
be sought in part three. Ingrid goes
undercover. Posing as a maid, she
goes to Ridley's Manor to unearth
evidence of Jasper's nefarious deal¬
ings.

Her cousin Daisy, already
employed at the Manor, proves to

mapped out the terrain, you can go
or run to wherever you want without
having to enter strings of compass
directions.

The instruction booklet Is clear
and concise and includes a few hints
orr Ingrid's Back and adventuring in
genera!. No game from Level 9 is
ever easy; if you get stuck, a hint
sheet is available which supplies
you with clues without giving too
much away,

Uh»t gnou? READ PEfllYw
It uas to comp la in about

f lain about Squire
ans to doMolish tbo
petition bore gno

vi 1 la
si9na

e. The
ures.

duickbuck^s plans to deMolish

Afnstrad User Msfcti t989

Page J3

R oy of the Rovers is a game
of two halves, just like the
game on which it is loosely
based. Following the threat
of a takeover by city property devel¬
opers, Roy Race, the clean cut,
comic strip hero, has organised a
5-a-side game in a bid to save Mel-
chester's famous ground,
if the team can't raise enough
money by 5pm the bulldozers will be

moving in. But the team has been
kidnapped, and Roy is racing against
time to rescue his other four players.

He faces constant threats from
booby traps, ambushes, numerous
hoodlums, heavies and opposition
supporters. Only Roy's mum is there
to help with refreshing cups of tea.

The game is played in the streets
surrounding the Melchester ground.
Roy's actions are controlled through

L ong ago, when the word
Ninja meant something
other than a scooter, a chap
called Lee Wong had a prob¬
lem. Not a problem that was
brought on by the mere whiff of
house dust, but a reaf difficulty.
Some evil cuss had been kidnapping
the local children, and Lee Worrg
was having none of it
The aforementioned varmint was
called Ryu Ken Oh, and had got the
name by being the least interesting
evildoer around, People just weren't
interested in him. When they heard
the name, they said, ''Ryu Kerr? Oh".

Old RKO was determined to be
taken seriously, and set about
building himself an army.

But no self respecting mercenary
would even consider working for ■
him, so he kidnapped children and

brainwashed them,

RKO lives at the end of Tiger Road,
in the big fortress just past the
school. So along the road trudges
0 u r hero Lee Wo n g, fol lowed closely
by his large and trusty axe.

No sooner has he started than he
is attacked by a troupe of Stunt
Ninjas (not the scooters). In true
Water Margin fashion there was one
troupe of Stunt Ninjas less when
The Man, Lee Wong, had passed.

Inside the fortress The Man is com
fronted by some rather slow giants
who stand about until you hit them
enough and then disappear for no
adeguately explained reason.

Dotted about are various goodies
that can give you a sword or a mace,
which are handy, or an axe, which is
not. You have to attack these things
to get at them. This sort of thing can

mM ^ il i il ,j _J _ J -

Ik 1 . J _rf ."K ^

B “■ T ■ J _ k A _1 . fc i h A -T-;

' •" *

moF

THE

HOVEBS

two menus, which enable him to
walk, run, smile, fight and pick up,
drop or use various objects. Options
can be selected using the keyboard
or joystick.

The classic strategies of all good
adventure games are needed -
exploration, character interaction,
the use of collected objects at the
appropriate time - anti all the time
the clock 1$ ticking away.

The characters Roy meets must be

be annoying in mid fight,

Once you have found your way
past the slow giants, it's a mad dash
along a corridor while tryirrg to
avoid large rolling brown thirrgs, I
guess these are meant to be logs,
but they look more like unformatted
chocolate biscuits to me.

Being hit by a biscuit causes you
to leap back and lose some strength.
Your axe lor sword or mace) can
make short work of them - it's all a
matter of timing.

Now comes the standard fight
with the heiry barbarian bit. The one
in this game is a real nasty. He has a
sneaky trick of climbing the walls to
drop on you from above.

The rinky-tinky Probe tunesmith
has been at work here, but the usu¬
ally neat graphics aren't. They move
speedily and smoothly enough, but
not very prettily.

Anything purporting to be mertial
arts-ish should have appalling dub¬
bing, This game just doesn't cut it by

approached in the correct manner if
they are to be persuaded to part with
information. Some will respond to
Roy's charm, while with others his
flashing smile produces a more
robust response.

Sometimes violence is the only
recourse, although if you picks fight
with the wrong man you will end up
with a severe pounding and a telling
off from Roy's mum.

This part of the game is great fun
to pfay. It has been produced with
refreshing style and wit.

At 5pm it is on to the match with
as many players as you have been
able to rescue. When it can be per¬
suaded to load, the E-a-side match is
something of a letdown, although it
is slightly more fun if you are forced
to play the opposition on your own.

Having said that, Roy of the
Rovers is worth playing for the
adventure part alone.

having very reasonable sO'Und
indeed. The game drops into a kind
of routine after a while, and several
levels are just variations on themes.
That is not to say they are not fun -
wasting varj.ous types of oriental
warriors is always good for a lark.

It's just a pity there are no hang¬
gliding Ninjas, as portrayed on the
cover.

Tiger Road could be classed as
dab, which is not as big as brill or
halibut, but it still retains most of the
charms of its bigger brothers,

Page 14

Amstrsd User March 1989'

viWkimi

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Rom

Protext (CP/M+)...

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Protext....

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Page 75

AmSlfad User March 1989

Brunlilord

’BrtffiWofd offers conskierabfe SexibiSy .., exceflent
spolfing checker ., * very easy to use datafSie^- CIVTA
"BrunlVord is a wry competent pir^ramme' -^hfT/X
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BrunWord 6128 £25.00

A supefb word pfoces&or is combined wKh s
lig^>tnmg speed spelimg checker and a card
filling pfogr^mm^f to give you a tasf and
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be easy to use and yet has all the powerful
features that you expect from g cornprehensive
word processor.

Simply type BUtJ “BBUMWOflO'^ to losd the word
processor, the spelling checker and the 30,000
word dictionary. When the ioadlng is compiete,
remcwe the BrunWord ctec and put safely away. The
disc drive is then compielely tree tor your own
data disc+

Reimamber that many word processors only work
efficiently if you have 8 second disc drive. For
eKample, the disc version of Protect needed the
disc to be changed eight times to check the
spelling of our test file^ whereas BrufiWord
needed no disc in the drive.

BrunWord is supplied with a 40 page manual
which has several detailed exampieSp starting
with step by step instructions 1o produce and
print a simple letter. But the very first step is
to load the TUTOR file Into BrunWord^ This takes
even the complete novice straight into word
processing and ctenxtnstrates the powerful editing
and formatting features of BrunWord. There are
also examples of printer control, showing how to
create headings, to underline or to emphasiSp and
five deliberate spelling error? for you to
correct. The tutor takes about 20 minute? to run
through and after that you will leel confident to
type In your own text*

BrunWord Features

*40. 80 or 12SI column display *Touch typing speed
over 200 words/mh *Truie insert or overwrite
*Ju5tify/unjustify paragraph or whole text
*Ai5tified te^ has bsjanced appearance *lfistarit
word wrap *6fock save^ copy, insert and
delete ^Local editing with word delete/undelete
*Ad^taWe margin? and TA&s *Cokjmn/Line/Page
iJsplay with tile name *True word count *Ffnd and
replace *Help menus Hlemory filing system ^Single
character embedded printer commands tl8 with
3 printer codes and 21 with 10 printer code?)
*Page throw markers *Wultipie copies *Odd/even
page headers/footers with page funb^rs
file printing (new page or continuous) *Print
specified page? * Works with any printer *True
display super/subscript numbers *t>ser defined
print characters *Load ASCII files from other
word processors *Save ASCII fNes for other word
processors *Files can be encrypted *Maximum file
size about 9 pages of text.

BrunSpell Features

*MBmory resident with word processor ^Checks
4^000 words/min *30^000 word dictionary *Wo
American spellings *Add up to 5,000 of your own
words *lnsta.nt lookup *Helps to find correct
spelling * Automatic correction.

DataFile Features

* Alphabetical^ numeric aln date sorting on any
field *User defined headings *Search routine
+Data merging into BrunWord *Label printing.

BrunWord Junior £12.95

This is a low cost version ot BrunWord 6129 on
; 3 Inch disc and includes the spelling checker

with 30,000 word dictionary.

Type In a letter or a short essay, check it
for spelling errors, save it to ^our disc and
then print it out*

BrunWord Jiwiiof i? for the CPC612S and has all
the features of BrunWord and BnMiSpdf but with
two smaH changes. The text area has been reduced
to hold just one page of text (about 600 words)
and you cannot save words to the dictionary. It
is supplied with a TUTOR file on the disc and an
instructioo manual.

You can upgrade later to the hJl BrunWord tor
just £12.95.

Letters

We receive many letter? each monttk The foilowi^
ware all received in the three week? before
writing thi? advertisement.

r am extremely pleased with BrmWord 6129, and
I will certainly update my copy. May I congratulate
you on maiang such an improvement to an already
excellent programme.

Mr S (Gloucestershire)

i am writing to say how much I en}oy using the
BrunWord disCn It is easy to use and as I am not
a good speller the dictionary I? most essential*

I I dislike writing letters but the disc makes it
easy and much more exciting.

Clare (age 12 - Herefordshire)

' I wish to upgrade (BrunWord) to lnffo“Script* May
I congratulate you once again on a superb
product, without which I would be lost.

Mr L (Nottingham)

I have been using Bi^Word tor quite a white and
like it very much^ I ha^e told my friends bow
good and user friendly it 1?+ Also the speed and
ease ot commands. I enclose cheque for updating
to Info-SerSpti
Mr G (ScotliiHi)

lnfo“Scr(pt has got to be the best buy for
Amstrad 6129 word processing. Keep up the good
work,

Mr McO (Leicester)

Info-Script £46.00

Take the BrunWord disc, replace Datafile with g
comprehensive felational database, integrate this
into BrufiWofd and the result is Info-Script.

At its simplest Into-Script is no more compJeK
than DataFile but with the attraction of direct
access from the word proceasoo many new and
enhanced facilities and the ability to store at
least twice as much data. It is possible to have
the database. tt» word processor* 1000 names and
addresses and 6 pages of text all In the memory.

You are typing a letter in BrunWord and need
an adtk'flss. Place an address marker iA where it
is need. Go to Info-Script and search for the
address, using eayj, the house name* Press T for
Transfer and you are back in BrunWord with the
marker replaced by the address.

Info ^Script has powerful progressive search
facilities, a unique four marker system and it
can sort data alphabetically* numerically, date
or reverse order- It can add* multiply or divide
and any number of fields can be added into a
running total* which can be inserted into one of
the fields. Records can be related by two
different methods, SOW? or DAUQHTfflS.

The data merging facilities are exter>sive but
the simplest personalised letters require just
thcae markers. SA 4W 40. These construct a full
address, a full name and insert the date.

Info-Script p? easy to start but has the power
to keep up with your needs.

Comparisons

Wa have tested BrifiWord 6128. Pretext (dsc) ard
Tasword 6128 with the same file of 3366 words.

BrunWord scrolled 40K taster than Protext
which in turn scrolled 19J faster than Tasword.

Protext was the fastest to justify but needed
a separate operation to see the result- BrunWord
produced the best appearance of all three and was
30 times faster than Tasword.

Our simulated typify test reached 219 words
per minute. Both BrunWord and Pretext had no
trouble at this speed but Tasword was very slow
inserting text into the start of a paragraph and
could only handle 16 words/minufe.

The spelling test checked all 3366 words.
BrunSpell took 52 second? and needed no disc
changes. Prospell took 6 min 24 sec and needed
8 disc changes. Taspell took 19 min 46 sec and
needed 3 disc changes.

BrunWord 6128 with BrunSpell 4 DataFile. . . £25.00
BrunWord Junior 6128 with BrunSpell. . . , . £12.95
info-Scr^t 6128 with BrunWord. Brun^ell,

backup copy and Disc Utilities . £46*00
(All supplied on 3in Disc - state which comput er)

Send cheqiie/postal onder/Aocdss number to:

Brunning Software

34 Helaton Road,

Chelmsford, Essex, CMl 5JF J
Telephone (0245) 252854 (24 Hours)

Page 16

Amstrad User Merch 7939

PETER PACKRAT

J UST before Britain's sewers
crumbie to brick dust, Peter
Packrat dnakes his presence
felt This "cute little rodent"
lives in a junk yard - quite a
comedown from an Atari arcade
machine.

Anyway, you control Peter using
keyboard or jovstick, You have to
guide him round the junk yard and
the adjoining sewers, pick up any
loose bits and pieces such as gold
bars lirt a junk yard?) and take them
back to his den, a decrepit wooden
hut perched between a couple of
telegraph poles.

As usual, nasty things are trying to
stop Peter completing his task; they
include everything from winged
books, bumble bees and spiders to

Riff Rat,_lhe villain of the piece. One
touch from him is fatal. The sewers
contain sludge; if Peter falls in, he is
immersed up to his neck and can
move only very slowly,

There is a great variety of move¬
ments. Peter can stoop to negotiate
ledges or enter pipes, he can slide
down inclined planks, be catapulted
through the air by a springboard,
clamber through the spider's web,
climb ladders and steps - he can
even do a tightrope walk across teie-
phone wires and jump impossible
distances.

To keep the rrasties at bay, he fires
missiles. Accurate shots paralyse
and give extra points.

Platforms and Ladders, you may
say, Origirsality is not Peter Packrat 's

NETHERWORLD

S UBTITLED Planet of Pur¬
gatory, Netherworld is a
happy marriage between
two old but immortal ideas
- Boulderdesh and shoot-'em-ups.
You are inside a gyroscope-like
spinning spaceship "in a
place locked in eternal
conflict where the
forces of good and
evil battle for
complete domination".

No, its not the
House of Commons,
but a brick-walled
maze littered with
demons, goat heads
and alien generators
which spit deadly nasties.

There are other curiosities, such
as scanner mines, bounder mines,
hover mines and metamorphosis
walls. Danger lies everywhere,
fortunately your ship fires in four
directions at once. If it didn't, you
wouldn't last long.

Your mission is to move from
level to level by collecting t5
diamonds in three minutes. There
are very few diamonds ready and
waiting to be picked up: you have to
create more.

Rocks car} he pushed
into squeezes, which
miraculously change
them into diamonds.
Deflecting a mine
into a meta¬
morphosis wall
transforms it
into four dia¬
monds. Eggs can
be shot, giving you
extra points.

Jumping into a teleport chamber
or opening 3 secret door will trans¬
fer you to the parts of the maze that
other ways cannot reach. Absolute
life-savers are the hourglasses. Pick¬
ing one up gives you an extra 30
seconds.

A touch of randomness is added

^ r

■

strong point. The playing area is
rather small and the graphics. Which
are two colours in Mode 1 and look
suspiciously like a direct port from
the Spectrum, are not up to Silver-
bird standard. The animation is OK
though, with lots of frames for the
main characters,

A reasonable tune plays
throughout, but it's very short -
about 30 Seconds - and repetitive. It
tends to slow down slightly
whenever lots of characters appear
on the screen, and it can't be
switched off. Groan.

There is a high score table. You
are asked for diree irtitials and have
to select them laboriously with the
joystick rather than just typing them.
Green screen users will have great
difficulty seeing this, but the game
itself is perfectly clear.

The strangest feature is the ques¬
tion you are asked out of the blue on

loading; "Scroll between screens?
(V/N)", If you press Y the action
scrolls smoothly from screen to
screen. If you press N it flicks
between them almost instantan¬
eously, speeding the gameplay up
slightly.

Small playing area, tired scenario,
ugly graphics, yet inexplicably
addictive. Could have something to
do with the price.

by extra points when you shoot
something and, more importantly,
the surprise bonus. Denoted by a
cluster of question marks, it has four
•effects, two good and two bad. You
can get an extra life - you start with
five - or infinite lives, and you can
withstand 16 direct hits before you
are blown up. On the other hand, the
controls can be reversed or
compietdv scrambled,

Presentation is excellent. A good
loading screen and an even better
title screen with stars rushing ail

over the place, Control is via key¬
board or joystick. You can select one
of four levels to start on.

The playing area is large and
smooth-scrolling and the graphics
are enormous - colourful with no
problems in green. But the pi^ce de
resistance is the musical accompani¬
ment. It's more than just a coliectton
of turtes. There are sound effects on
one channel and the accompani¬
ment on the other two.

The pause mode, of all things, is a
revelation, You can turn the accom¬
paniment arrd/or sound effects up or
down. If you turn the accompani¬
ment right off, the sound effects
expand to fill all three ch-annels-
Dave Rodgers, the man behind the
music, has created at least the equal
of anything by the better known Rob
Hubbard,

After a couple of damp squibs,
Netherworld - a game born in
Finland, by the way - continues the
long tradition of excellent Hewson
shoot 'em ups.

Amsirad User March f989

Page 17

CCOROING to the patchily
translated inJay, your mis*
si on in Galactic Conqueror
is to annihilate the
enemies of peace throughout the
galaxy, We're supposed to be
peaceful then, are we? In that case
the world in general would dearly
love to know what those large lasers
are for.

The idea is to defend a totally
peaceful military base with totally
harmless enormously dangerous
lasers, Is It? Great. Obviously being
peaceful doesn't actually extend to
r>ot killing people.

Since everyone on Earth has for¬
gotten how to be nasty to people,

the impending threat of rebels with
large things that go Bang! is taken
seriously. Attempts to give flowers
to the rebels have mostly failed.
They kept the flowers. They even
returned the couriers. In bits.

Some bored technicians just hap¬
pened to have completed the utterly
harmless ultimate fighter, Thunder
Cloud II. This proves that even in the
future, version Ones seldom work.

Everybodyjn their nice peaceable
way, has forgotten how to pilot
spacecraft, so you, as a power boat
champion, have been chosen. Here
it becomes obvious that this is a
French game - such a daring piece
of illogic could only be carried of

We are talking advanced states of
anoer and resentment here. Various
♦ly and shoot at you. Missile
missiles and mines try
vieir very oust lo be in front of you.

Your job Is to prove, with the aid
of a megawatt laser, that being
peaceful is much more fun than
being nasty.

The blue terrain must be the sea,
as there is about as much scenery as
there isn't in Milton Keynes.

Once a certain number of rebels
have been dispatched to rest in
peace there comes the next bit. This
entails doing exactly the same as
before, except you can do rolls, just
like irii AfterBumer. Yet again there's

CONQUEROR

They share the
same good traits
- speed, speed,
and ..er., thafs it-

and the same bad
ones - poor visibility, tedium, repeti¬
tiveness. There is nothing new or
exciting here, which comes as a
surprise after the definitely odd and
clever Titan. All in all, it's a great
cure for insomnia.

Peveloper:
Thus Software

Tape: €9.J5
Disc; £t4.95

with continental panache.

Hebei planets appear like £its on
the galaxy map, and you can
navigate your way to the planet
using it faintly confusing crosshair
system. After that you're on your
own, kid.

The view is rather cunningly
placed behind your craft, as irr that
ever so popular game AfterBumer,
And, just like in AfterBumer, you run
into visibility problems when trying
to see ahead - you aet in the way.

no scenery, but everything moves
very fast.

Titus goes really all out on the
third stage because even the blue bit
that could be the sea is dispensed
with. There is only space, the final
frontier.

Once you've done the third bit,
guess what? Yep, go back to the
start and do it all again. The ennui
is overpowering.

Galactic Conqueror is almost an
AfterBumer clone.

A HH, this is more like it. No
pretence of a plot - just
shoot everything that
moves. Victory Road is of
the vertical scrolling variety, and
quite good it is too. The action is
fast, the movement smooth - both
uncommon for CPC machines.

The storyline is mirtimal. Just try
to get as far as you can up the long
road ahead. You are armed with a
gun and hand grenades to start with,
but you can pick up flamethrowers,
extra armour and better grenades if
you're lucky,

Once a boomerang-like weapon
made a brief appearance, but the
shock of it lost me a life. These
bonus features are lost if you lose
one of your six lives, which can lead
to some tricky situations ^ trapped
down an alley with four vampires
calls for a flamethrower at the very
least.

Occasionally you may be trans¬
ported to the den of some rather
larger nasty thing, who looks and
sounds like Colin with a hangover.
This stage is a real test of logic and
strategy. Blast it to bits as fast as you
can.

Where Victory Road becomes
really special Is with Its simulta¬
neous two-player option. This adds
another dimension fo the game as
you and a friend team up to get as
far into the game as possible. Of
course, teaming up means that you

Page 78

aOOQeSSO QQQQQOSa

VICTORY ROAD

also race to the bonus features, and
If perchance a hand-grenade should
accidentally hit your partner just as
she is about to get a flame-thrower.
Well, that's life, isn't it?

The controls are slightly odd in so
far as they support the Cheetah
rotational joystick. 1 didn't get a
chance to play with one of these. It
would certainly add to the game.
Without one, you must toggle
between shooting in the direction

you are running, or shooting const¬
antly in one direction,

Minor criticisms are that you need
a joystick for two people to play at
once - although my mouse worked
quite well - and that bullets are
sometimes hard to see on a green
screen.

The opening tune is pleasant, the
graphics reasonable - even if the
vampire does look like a flasher -
and the gameplay Is superb.

Developer:
Paradiec Scftware

Tape: £S.9$
Disc; £1:4.95

^Genuine Amsoft
CF2 3" disks
►Guaranteed Amsoft
quality and reliablity
►Supplied in the new
protective sleeves
►Buy from the UK's
largest supplier

BOX OF

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►Removes ink deposits
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PCW 9 Series £6.30

AMSOFT3'

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WITH EVERY
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QUALITY

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Con^imart are licensed crariit brokers. Simply ^sk for written detaib.

3" CF2 DISKS

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Gl HERO

N ot quite as jingoistic as
most games based on the
American armed forces,
the euphemisms are
fiying from the first sentence on the
iniay card. The game is set in a
"politically sensitive country", a few
hours' flight from the United States,
which is composed almost entirely
of jungle,

You have to capture Nato peace
documents which have been stolen
by a spy. You are aided end abetted

by a dog called Killer who has got
lost. After finding him, you can
move around the map, kill the
enemy soldiers, destroy their heli¬
copter base and enter their
encampment.

Various items help you, a direc¬
tion finder which can latch on to
radar beacons, a message decoder
to receive satellite transmissions
and a torch. All are selected using
the now ubiquitous icon control
system.

A S private investigator Rick
Shaw you are summoned
to the house of a lady who
is convinced that her hus¬
band, Mr Kingsley, is beirrg unfaith¬
ful. The first few moves set the
scenario for the game. As the plot
unfolds, Mr Kingsfey spends his
time not in the arms of a floosie but
traffickirig in recreatiorral narcotics.

Showing a surprising tack of
h onou r to th e cl lent or the fat fee she
holds, you have to go back to her
house in the rniddle of the night and
burgle it. A limited parser lets the
game dowr> here, with the most
obvious things being done in the
most obscure way.

There are about 90 locations split
into four areas. Starting at the King-

the local taxi firm.

As there is run car, bus, bicycle - or
even rickshaw - if s the taxi that gets
you between the four areas. With no
cash in sight, it's a good job this cat
firm knows you well enough to take
a cheque,

To complete the game it is necess¬
ary to collect four pieces of eV idence
within a time limit and present them
to a sergeant at the police station, a
kindly man who will jail you if at any
time you take your clothes off or
vandalise a fruit machine in the pub.

A trip to the camera shop brings
you face to face with Mr Kingsley,
and if you're quick enough you can
follow him to take a photo of him
and the gang up to dirty deeds, A
careful choice of camera and

Telecomsoffs programmers seem
to have a mania for representing 3D
playing grids on a 2D screen with no
isometric graphics to be seen; have
they suddenly gone out of fashion?

Cl Hero is yet another example,
Point your man into the screen and
press the up control to move to a
different level; too bad if you get
confused. Keyboard or joystick con¬
trols can be selected using the won¬
derfully logical Q for keyboard and A
for joystick.

The impossible has been clone in
simulating the Spectrum's attribute
problems. For those who have been
lucky enough never to encounter
this, our rubber friend the Spectrum
can only have two colours per cha¬
racter square; any more and you get
a mess.

Your man, and everything else
that moves, has a wide black border
previously reserved for mourning
cards. This is to stop the ever-so-
nasty yet non-existent colour
clashes.

Every graphic, without fail, is in
one colour - you'dthinktheCPChad
only the loud primary hues of the
Spectrum palette, such is the
subtlety with which they have been

chosen. The sole advantage of this is
that there is no problem In green.

After getting up- 4 fell off the chair
laughing - I would say Gl Hero
would be passable if the program
simulated mud wrestling rather than
the work of a trained assassin. The
graphics are very large, very slow
moving, and very jerky.

The tune is the de rigeur imperso¬
nation of rock music, with a few
more beeps than normal betraying
its ancestry, Sound effects are lim¬
ited to a few desultory bangs and
crashes.

This game isn't good enough, Not
even at budget price, Which it isn't.

sley house, it took me some time to another delve into the cheque book telephone bo,Kes are, because this is will help the gameplay.

realise that careful self-searching should help here. your only way to call a taxi. They Not too difficult, not too many

was needed to find the number of Keep a careful note of where the don't cruise around looking for locations, this is a worthy text-only

fares. task for both a novice and a regular

The phone box on the industrial player, An adventure fanatic might

estate gets vandalised after one use find it a little limited but, as they say,

and you have to break into a factory size isn't everything...

to use a phone. From then you have
10 moves to phone and get out or
it's arrest and jail. Ail of this taxi
travel car* be wearing on the cheque
book so a visit to the bank for a new
one may be needed.

I enjoyed playing Rick Shaw, who
despite his difficulty communicating
and his lack of ethics, was a
refreshing change. No doubt when
he reappears in the next game the
parser will be more dytramic, which

Psge 20 Amstrad Uset March 1983

T|ieY€^tR nf T\\t i^dedt

fJkrjUlifACe

If you wish to be oble to ST^P any program at any time and COPY it to disk or tape, fully automatically,
a( a toucti of a button, then MULT I FACE 2+ is the ONLY answer. There are no other comparable
hardware devices, aod the software copiers simply cannot compete

Firstif you eaftnot coinpira the SUCCESS ratio ot any tape sopier with the lUULTtFACE ~ you get
what you pay tor (and we throw fa a tot more with the MULTIFACE. . .}.

TAPE COPIEftS always aeed to be loader! first, whilst muuifaCE has ati software m nOM for
iastaat use. TAPE COPtEHS eaa only aSeropt fa sopy a program as it s^tu^, haioro it toads - Smro
are various prutoritioBS ia the way sad aat enough rOemOry for both the program to be sopied aad
the copier. MUl JiFACE is diUeroat: you can load aoy program from TAPE or DISK, ran it as you wish
am! activate the MULTIFACE whenever you need it. Once you SAVE a program, be it to OfSK or
TAPE, you eatt COffTtfiUE it, SAVE it again it you wish, etc. to fact, you can play games as aaver
before: there is ao need to start from the begitming each Ume you play a game (as you would with a
tape oopier-ititcould tropyin the first place «. Siuse you can SAVE a prograta at ANY TIME and
contiaue it, you can amually SAVE as you progress through a game, ft, avoatuatty, you loose aft
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manage to gat INFiNtTE LIVES to start with: MUL HFACE has a bufft-fo TOOLKIT which afiows you to
STUDY aad ALTER anythlag la aay program: you can thus POKE in iaflnite lives, ammo, etc.
Multiface is extremely sirnple to use, triendiy, idiot-proof, menu-driven with on-screen instructions,
fully automatic - PURE MAOlC. It can be used on any CPC, comes with a cable and an extension bus
for £47.95 ONLY I By the time you buy 10 programs on tape instead of disk - MULTfFACE will pul them
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STOP IT/iT v^NX MOMEAJT AArD

iNSJDE/? reveals EVERyTHIWG:

ir WJLL FULLY PtSASSeMBie,
pNO TEXT OR CODE, V/EW/ALTEff

DUMP TO PRINTER - ALL TM/C "
ON DISK FOR /U|| V

ANY CPC
ONLY
L£29-95i

ROOOS reouires a ROMBOARD, RODOS EXTRA needs RODOS. INSIDER needs MULTI FACE gT

Tape to diak louch .t b>u.rron

Ridiculous, may say. but it wotitseveiy
lLmc Stuitif^ce caji slop ary ptDcpiam in ifs
Uark.s and save Ihe itom tn^mgry

ID eidiei lapc- QT diak ]i: s CCCDpLc'I'CIy lQOi

pio[>1 SjmiLA/ pioduci? hav<“ h.id problems
wiiji sizt. and. even sound

Mukifscif ra.Fi J^ad*.clle a&& l>ies-r with&ui a
se-cpnd ihdbu.qhi

Th-ii would have MfsKTi-i'd many

bu1 RomanCiC PdiMi tian gone- one
step funhe-i. LnrOTF^^^^fbnq- a moiTiOiy uiJf
rcF Mo program is aaie wilh Ihis p-vl-fy
thun-g IS out in t^.e open, tneluding bhe 230
regial^ES. CPtC d.ir.i 4 cir| .iny p.jrr
meinOF V

Don'1 be fooled mro thinking thi-s will
lesu.tl' in mass- psTn.ey. b-OWOVN'r The--

unji iiself musb be plugged inro youi
Arpirra-d 1o allow reload-FFig oJ a prog rim it
saved

Mhhff-ice n muar be iho eJeverest haid-
waie device ai present a necessity loi
dFsk owners who U-iOugh! Lhey were stuck

wilh Ir^Adirig (iDm rapt; Et-vety lirTifr

amstrai) .xr: TiON iani lAkV 1^7

Would you like to be able to attach additional disk drives -
40/80 track, single/double sided, 5,25 or 3.5 or 3 inch - and
store up to 800K par disk? All controlled by a powerful DOS?
Have RANDOM ACCESS to your files? Get a PRINTER
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Now also available: RODOS EXTRA on disk for only £9,95.
Any RODOS owner will find RODOS EXTRA indispensable:
it offers nearly 200K of valuable information how to get the
most out of RODOS, with examples of RODOS applications
ranging from simple to complex such as a DISK DOCTOR or
IBM MSDOS DISK READER. The indispensable EXTRA!

TH€ YEltR Of UK RDBDT-KPMrjartT

I Order: MULTI FACE 2 E47.95n RODOS £29.95 □ Plus p&p UK E1, EUROPE £2

INSIDER £14.95 □ RODOS EXTRA £9.95 □ Overseas £3

I enclose a cheque PO for £...or debit my

Name & address....*.

54 Deansc''Di1 Ave. Lon dor* MW 9 SEM

Card exp

Amstrad User March 1989

Page 21

SOFTWARE THATS

HARD TO BEAT

TASWORD 6128

TASWORD UPGRADES

TAS-SPELL

The Word Processor - with Mail Merge
The established, powerful word processor for
the Amstrad CPC 6126. TASWORD 6128 has
been specifically developed to use B4K of
rtemory as text space, This means a text file
can be a massive 60,000 characters in length,
enough room for over 10,000 words!

Featuring all standard and many extra word
processing facilities TASWORD 6128
incorporates sophisticated pnnt options,
on-screen help, notepads, user definable keys
allowing commonly used words, sentences or
paragraphs to be typed with a single keypress
and a powerful buih-ir data merge facility.
Extensive customisation fadlitios allow many
of the facilities to he changed for personal
TOQuiremenrs and saved into the program.

By combining power with ease of use
TASWORD 6123 is the complete word
processQ rfartheCPC6128. Discf24.dS

TASWORD 464-D

TASWORD 464

The Word Processor
Your 464 becomes a professional standard
word processor with TASWORD 464.

Supplied complete with a comprehensive
manual and a cassette which contains both
the program and TASWORD 464 TUTOR.

This teaches you word processing using
TASWORD 464. Whether you have serious
applications or simply want to learn about
word processing, TASWORD 464 and the
TUTOR make it easy and enioyabla

Cassette £19.95

TASWORD 464 and Am sword owners: send
your original cassette or disc I not the
packagingl as proof of purchase and £13.90.
Ybur original will be returned together with
TASWORD 464-D or TASWORD 6126 on disc.

TASCOPY 464

The Screen Copier
for the CPC 6128,664 and 464

A suite of fast machine code screert copy
software for the CPC computers. Print high
resolution screen copies in black and white
and also large "shaded" copies with different
dot densities for the various screen colours.
TASCOPY can also print "poster siz^' copies
— screen copies printed onto two or four
sheets car be cut and joined to make the
postar. Disc £12.90 Cassette £9.90

The Word Processor - with Mail Merge*

The TASWORD especially developed to utilise
the capabilities of the CPC 464 and 664 disc
drives. Additional facilities Inctude a larger
text file size and automatic on-scree a disc
directories during save and load operations.

A major feature is the data merge facility.

Mail merge, in which a letter is printed any
number of times, each iodividuallv addressed
to a different person, is just one application of
this powerful facility. TASWORD 464-D is
supplied on, and only runs on, disc.

Disc £24.95

TAS‘SI GN

The Sign Maker
for the CPC 6128 andPCW
Produce and print your own signs, posters,
banners and large notices to get your
message across with maximum impact.

A complete sign making package including
four distinctive lettering styles, character
heights from one inch to the full width of the
paper, italics, underlining, borders, eight
shading patterns, variable letter spacing,
automatic kerning and line centering.

Signs may be printed across the paper or
along the length of the paper to produce
irge eye-catching banners and notices.

Oise £29.95

TAS-8IGM — additional fonts

wo new, impressive fonts forTAS-SIGN, the
sign maker: ROMAN a clear, classical font
and HOBART, a bold and imposing typeface.

Disc £12.50

PERFECTIQN IN PROFESSIONAL SOFTWARE

The Spelling Checker
Spelling mistakes and typing errors spoil any
document whether it's a private letter or your
latest novel. With TAS-SPELL you are free to
be creative in the confident knowledge that
your spelling won't let you dowrr.

TAS-SPELL checks the spelling of text typed
with TASWORD 464-D and TASWORD 6128
by comparing the words in your text with
those in a dictionary of over 20,900 words.
Suspect words are highlighted — you may
correct, ignore (it might be a namel or even
add words to the dictionary. Rease note that
TAS-SPELL only works with TASWORD 464-D
and TASWORD 6128. Disc £16.50

TASPRINT 464

The Style Writer
for the CPC 6128,664 and 464
A must far dot matrix printer awners!

Print Tasword output and program listings in
a choice of five impressive print styles.

Varying from the futuristic DATA RUM to the
hand writing style of PALACE SCRIPT,
TASPRINT gives your output originality and
style! Disc £12.90 Cassette £9.90

TAS-DIARY

The Electronic Olary
TAS-DIARY for the Amstrad CPC 6128,
664 and 464 with disc drive
Keep an electronic day-to-day diary on disci
TAS-OIARV features a clock, calendar and a
separate screen display for-every day of the
year. Each year stored on disc includes a
memo pad and several note pages.

TAS-DIARY is an invaluable aid to keeping
records, reminders, and any other data which
is related to that most valuable commodity of
OUTS — timei Disc £12,90

Sprin^yd Houser Hyde iRfraci LS2 9LN. TpI 10532) 430301

T99-Si^, Td^rinl ^nd 1|3:ip|jv ijm^nenrlv ^ doc^airiA

prfntersffiDkjding chose fradff by;

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PanKonic Scar

C. \i<\h

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II you do not wont to ojl this magaflue, simply wmeoui ycuf under and post to: TASMAN SOFTWARE, DEFT ACU, SPftiNGFlEUJ HOUSE, HYDE TERRACE. LEEDS LS2 9LN

1 RnrInsR artiPtiiiFs'PH marTR pa^h-lR rnTASMANSnlstwrari? 1 fri OR rhascjl^ ffiy ADDlFSS^VlSA immUfir:

Eypifios

NAME ITfM

PRIC^

ADDRESS

Qtj liitfe Elf DDE acid £2.00 aer i lem air maii.

T^lephoftc AtcessiVisa orders Leeds (D63?H3B35tt

TCfTAL £

PlHasB rand me 3 FREE TaEman hnochuradra&itiiTiy vOu' iftyA-noEirKJ PCQ Amsirjd PQW Q Amsirad CPC SpEclrurTT--3 Qi^Spaclrum Aaitn38lCi'

*2 □Commodore 64 □Teiung EinsiHm □ /dJ

ECHELON

E CHELOM promises a 3D
space exploration and a
combat flight simulator. The
manual was written for the
Commodore 64 versiori, so it has
sections which are irrelevant and
downright misleading.

Although you are supplied with a
small piece of card with the CPC
keySj several options - such as the
timer - appear to he missing,

The controls are awkward. For¬
ward derust is applied by pressing
Shift and the key for up. What's
wrong with a separate thrust key?
Emergency stop is selected by
pressing the spacebar. Now there's
realism for you - coming to an
immediate stop from several
kilometres per second.

A brief history of the universe is
supplied, which tries to explain the

complicated plot based on pirates
and th’e good old Federation. It
wouid appear that you are on the
side of the Federation and must
track down their base by collecting
objects and constructing a map.

The graphics are Mode D,
colourful and chunky. The display is
very disappointing compared to the
screen shots on the box. The update
time is slow. If this really annoys you
the program allows several features
to be left out to speed things up - an
interesting approach to pro*
gramming.

The radar display is appalling.
After Elite, anything that doesn't
give you an indication of the height
of the enemy, or requires constant
referral to a compass, is a Bad
Thing.

A vehicle can be dropped to the

ground. You can drive around in it
and watch your own spaceship fly
away without you. The explorable
universe is large and reasonably
detailed. Several training zones are
supplied, which is a good idea.

As an extra feature the program
crashes if you use up ali the
ammunition. This is a bug that really
should have been found and fixed at
the play-testing stage. ITs very obyi-
ous, and darned annoying.

Q:i.tOUB

[>avQlciper;

Attest Software.

Tape: £12.99

Di^; £1199

BA ULES

option to save a battle for continuing
later is there, and a battle can be
terminated arid de-briefed at any

time.

The de-brief is a statistrcal display
of the situation so far, showing
forces and tosses for both sides. The
information is presented in the same
way as the sumrnary at the end of a
battle, but while an aid to the
players, it isn't an accurate feature
unless the Huns had two-way radio
and databases.

One thing I find uncomfortable
with this and many other wargamea
(S giving orders when only one
ptayer can look at the screen at a
time. This is a very tacky way of
solving the confidentiality problem.

If you venture away from the
provided scenarios and into the

realms of setting up your own bat¬
tles, you can decide on how many
points each battle will be, with
rough guides to the time taken for
point levels provided.

An option for unlimited battles is
included, but as you increase the
size of the battle and the number of
units the thumbtwiddle ratio
irtcreases because the computer has
to do individual calculations for the
visibility of each unit.

players have decided which
ry to belong to, it's off to the
army lists to choose from the avail¬
able forces. With the 24 riations and
the scenarios provided it won't be
long before you are designing maps,
trying out different troops in differ-
enl terrain and for anyone proficient
in POKEing artd PEEKing, new army
lists shouldn't be a problem. Details
on the construction of army lists are
available from CCS if you send them
a stamped addressed envelope.

Battle is what it's ail about end,
once engrossed imHun-bashing, the
time soon dwindles away with one
hour becoming another, and so on.
Plus there is always the, "t wonder
what would have happened if..."

Mol as high a tensiorr factor as
some of the earlier games from this
author, but the meticulous attention
to detail gives Ancient Battles a
place on the shelf of any wargamer.

Devsicpef:
Bfib Smith

Ta|>e: E14.B5

F ollowing on fram vuican,

Arnhem and Desert Rats,
Ancient Battles lets you fight
battles from 3000 BC to AD
700, The battle notes take you from
the Hittites to the Visigoths, Details
of equipment and small inset maps
of campaign routes are Included.

There are two tapes, one with the
battle and selection programs on
and the other with army lists
scenarios.

There are infinite possibilities to
the seasoned wargamer and in the
great tradition of wargaming, every
option is open to modification.
Whether you want to fight the bat¬
tles as they ware fought historically
or make modifications to see what
wouid have happened, this is the
place to do it.

To see how pure logic works on a
situation, the ability to let the com¬
puter play both sides comes in
handy - as well as being enter¬
taining, it is a useful way to plan
tactics.

Once a battle is underway it is
possible to change Ihe number of
players, the length of battle, whettter
it is night, the visibility level and
deployment of troops. The normal

Amstrifd OserMsfsh J389

Pgge 23

rs oh so trend/ to like the
'sixties trash TV stuff at the
moment. Probably because
there are still warehouses full of
original promo junk that needs
shifting. That's enough cynidsm...
for the moment, at least.

Long ago, when Isometrics were
still slightly in vogue, Batman
appeared as a veiy successful Ocean
game. Now windowing is the NBT
(hype marketing term - Next Big
Thing) so Batman The Gaped
Crusader has it. It also has a fairly
simple and usable icon system, but

Y OUfl mission is to destroy
seven missile bases using
your McDO'nald-Oouglas
VIOL ground attack jet, the
American version of the British Har¬
rier jump-jet. After leaving your
carrier you battle your way inland
toward the enemy bases, which
must be dive bombed, head back to
the carrier, refuel and re-arm.

Then you take off and go and blow

all will be revealed in good time.

You really get two games for your
dosh, since there are two separately
loading s>censrios. The first game,
which is possibly slightly easier, fea¬
tures that avian felon The Penguin. It
is called A Bird in the Hand, and in it
he plans to take over the world using
his robotic penguirts.

The umbrella factory where these
are made is guarded by skinhead
henchmen and Penguin clones, so
getting in loses a fair amount of
energy. Nobody bieS'in this game.
They get kicked about a bit, though.

The second game. A Fete Worse
Than Death, has that cheeky chappie
The Joker in it. Robin has gone miss¬
ing - no loss, you cry - and only The
Joker can be to blame. He's planted
charges under the Batcave, so you
could go out with a bang.

Choosing and using the right
objects - not to mentiorr finding
them - is critical. Thankfully most
objects can only be used in the

correct location, so you can't waste
them. Note the "most", the vital
object In the first game can be used
anywhere.

The authors, Special FX, have
spent some time refining the option
screen, which ail runs together
niceJv. Changing between action
and option screens gives a very
flash Batfade, as seen in the tv
show, The graphics, although very
neat and fast, are a bit dull, hinting
at a Spectrum ancestry. This isn't
necessarily bad, but It dulls the
game's polish.

Two tunes exist in both games.
Both are good, and ail the better for
being switchable. Neither are the
Dtnna Dinna tune. Fast and Loud
music merchants have made this
tune a folk anthem, and you kind of
miss it after a while.

The screens are drawn up in win¬
dows which overlay the previous
screen. This is dorre well enough so
you don't realise that the playing

area is usually very tiny. Some
screens are captioned, and these
give very obvious clues as to what
object to use there. This Is really
handy because your average ACU

Davelcper: Special FX
Tape^ £9 J5
Disc: £14,95

games reviewer is thick as mince,
and needs all the help she can get.

Batman The Gaped Crusader will
suit riddlers of all ages. It's pretty yet
tacky, clever yet crass, logical yet
wacky, but most of all it's fun. Defi¬
nitely better than the cost of four of
five mediocre budget games.

OPERA TION HORMUZ

up another base. You have three
harriers to complete the mission.
These are lost if you crash, if you are
hit by enemy fire or if your carrier is
hit,

The enemy wilf respond with anti¬

aircraft fire from the ground and air-
to-air missiles from MIG 21s. You
can release ftares to confuse the
enemy's heat-seeking missiles and
fire your own missiles at the MIGs.

The weapons you are supplied
with consist of ordinary cannons,
air-to-air missiles, air-to-ship mis¬
siles and bombs. Occasionally an
Fxocet missile witi hurtle past and
destroy your carrier,

Ft Is generally a good idea to shoot
these, but I'm sure destroying
Exocets with cannon fire does not
back up the game's claim of a realis¬
tic end highly detailed si mu let! on.

Controlling the plane is very dlffi-
cuFt. Pulling the joystick back will not
send you into the clear blue yonder
but into a crater on the ground. Left
or right sometimes changes the
direction you are flying in and

sometimes causes you to loop-the-
loop,

Operation Hormuz is not aimed at
the wargame or simulation crowd,
yet it doesn't have the variation or
excitement to make a good shoot-
'em-up. It sort of got lost along the
way somewhere.

Oevelopef: Durflll.
Tape: £9.99
Oise: £14.99

Amstr^d User Msreh 1983

TRYBRIDGE SOFTWARE DISTRIBUTION

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Please send cheque/P OiAocess. Visa number and expiry date lo;

TRYBRIDGE LTD,

72 North Street, Romford, Essex RM1 IDA.

Please remember to state the make and model of your computer when ordering.

P&P INC. UK on orders over £5,00. Under £5.00 and Europe add £1.00 per item. Elsewhere add £2 00 per item for AIR MAIL
_These offers are ma» order only Telephone order: 0708 765271

2.05

Unbe&tBble vaiue

CPC464

CPC664

CPC6128

MONEY MANAGER

SAVE £5 on RRP Of £29.95 when you Ofder direct ffam-Connect Systems

ONLY £24.95

IncL VAT, P&P

Unrivalled features
Money Manager Plus
for PCW 8256,8512,
9512, PCI 512,1640,
PPC

£39.95

Inc. VAT, PSP

Financial management software for personal and/or small business use

Man^^r ia an aasy-lo-use systein for raoording all financial transactions, and for analy siftg them In a number of very po werfu I way s in order to laciliiate sound
f i nandal management .Itisideaiforoontmllingthe finances of a smaH business, or for users wishing to control ftielr personal llnanees in a business-like way. Jse it to
check bank statemenls, keep traok of OKpenctliire. monitor cash flow, make budgeling forecasts, prepare business linanoial slatemenls, padly your bank manager,
convince the tax and VAT inspeclors, avoid nasty surphses, elc. etc.I

12 moriths of entries are kept in afile stored on yourtf sc. Atanyl^me, you may load afileintothecompuiermemory. add to credit the entries, analyse ihem, print statements,
andthensavethe updated tile lor lalerirse. Entries maybehistoric{lor record keeping) or! oracasKf or budgeting]. You may have any nu mber cl separate f lies. and make
copies Of files for archive purposes, You may advance fhe period covered by a nig month by rnomh,

—

Upfo too separate iransaclions may be entered per month. Each

entry consists of:

• The day of the ntorfh, e.g. 23rd ol June.

• Art eccouot number, one of up to 9 defined by you to suit your
oircumsiancese.g. 1° Barclays. 2°=Visa, 3«HalKax etc.

• Reference, e.g ABC 123 for a ch^ue number or Invoice reference,

• A class 00 ^, one of up to 50 definedby yduto suH your
circumsiancese.g, hO=Househofd expenses, hl -Mortgage,
h2-Rates or p0= Production, pt -Raw materials, p2-Assembly,
p3=Packtng, etc.

• A description so that you can see what each transaction was for.
$.g. 'New gearbox" or 'Box of f 0 discs.'

• An optional slrr^e Character mark which you may Includefor
lurtherdassiflcaition, e.g. b-business, p=prlvate, etc.

• The amount of the transaction, which maiy be pAis or minus.

• A matker to IndPcaie whether the entry Is exempt, aero rated or
taxable for VAT, or alternatively the actual VAT paid.

—

You may eelecl categories according to account, class and mark (e.g.

aN entries, or all rrvlorlng expenses tor business u$i ng a credil card,

eicT and produce reports on the screen or primer as follows:

V Full detailed state™ nis, showing each transaction tor any month
or tor the whole year,

V Detailed monthly VAT statement showing Input and oulpuf
amounts exciudirw vat, lhe actual vat and Ihe total amount, plus
lotals and nel VAT due.

• Tables showing the totals In each class for each monlh of the year

• Tables showing the lotals in each Class tor each accouiil.

• Tables showing monihly maximum, minimum, average baiarrces,
tumover, cashlTow etc.

• Bar graphs ol arty category month by month.

• Fhe charts of annual totals tor various categories (CPC version
only),

Plui.; ttMtfIng ordMt-enelit opllMiHy torted Inle dtt* MdMMtatn Mertrh
IxcMIty. Cenptelw^tJv* ntnuel •ml full ••( of pr*cllc* d*li IrKtuded.

Full Nophon* *vp9«Ft.

Sendctteque or credit card number or phone forimmedate despatch

Connect Systems

3 FEancHford Road, London W12 9ND. 01*743 9792 Sam-IOpm 7 days a week

VtSA

Amstrsd User March 1939

Page 25

INVEST WITH PRO'PUNTBR

TUm your CPC6128 Into on expert racing odutser,^

★ PRO-PUNTER Is a sophisticated, disc-based expert
computer system for home micros which ACCURATELY
Interprets horse racing form,

★ In extensive trials over both FLAT AND NATIONAL HUNT
seasons:

57% of horses top-rated by PRO-PUNTER won.
representing an average post tax PROFIT per race of 80%
of capital Invested.

85% of winners came from within the top three rated,
represenung an average post-tax PROFIT per race of 18%
all three backed.

■k Researched and developed over three years, PRO-PUHTER
uses Information from the racing press and analyses ALL
major aspects of racing form.

★ Produces a RACE FORECAST, generates a COMPUTER
S.P., highlights good and poor VALUE BETS and OFFERS
INVESTMENT ADVICE,

★ PRO-PUNTER adjusts automatically to the race under
analysis. You don't need to be an expert yourself.

"A Since its launch in May 1987. proofing to the racing press
has resulted in a proAt in excess of 80 level-stake points
over 70 races and a strike-rate In excess of 50%.

★ Available now on CPC 6128, all Amstrad PCWTs. BBC.
Atari ST, IBM and PC machines,

PRICE £57.60 including VAT, P^tP,

Orders and enquiries to: DGA SOFTWARE,

PO Box 36, Ashton-Under-Lyne, Lancs OL7 9AJ,

Tel; 061-330 0184. Please Specily Machine

WOPS

Disc Manager and Copier

Now with NEW 'Simuiated ROM’ option. Fast & easy to use.
WOPS includes ICON control, BACKUP almost any disc,
MULTI FILE copy, disc EDIT, extended FORMATS. SCREEN
dumps, ARCHIVE to tape, extra RSX oommands and much
more.

Price; £14.95 inc. postage, {atl CPC)

GM CHESS

Chess Game & Tutor

Learn about openings, mid-game and end game tactics, play
the computer at fast or normal chess, solve chess problems
or just watch the machine play itself. All the options you need
including recap, swap sides 0,1 or 2 players, 7 levels etc.
Price; £14,95 (Disc Only), (all CPC)

irnERCEPTOR

SUPERCHARGE your MINI OFFICE 21 This ingenious
program gives over 14 functions available INSTANTLY from
any point inside M02, Afterwards M02 is resumed from
where it left off. Create 'pro-forma' documents, spreadsheets
etc. (complete with parameters) & save to disc using Save
Image, Transfer data from ANY program (e.g, Spreadsheet)
into the word processor. Use complete disc functions (format,
disc & flte copy, erase/rename/list files). You can even call up
a calculator or note-pad, or convert any text file into M02
format. All without leaving M02.

IMPORTANT: Requires disc version of Mini-Office 2 and
CPC6128 or 46A'&64 plus 64K expansion.

Price £14,95)nc postage.

Mini-Office 2 is a trademark of Database Publications

CAMEL MICROS

Wefipark, Wileys Ave,, EXETER EX 2 SBE
Telephone: 0392 421105

ALL OUR PRICES INCLUDE CARRIAGE & VAT

HSV COMPUTER SERVICES LIMITED, (ACU)

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NEW!

Coniinuous Stationery
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»5GSM £7.95

for 250

lust Covers
PC 464 2pcc set ^£7.50

:PC612&2pcesct =£1.50

IMP 2000 Wnter Cover =£4.50

rung water-resistant,
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rey with Royal Blue piping

X™® Ti ^Im Mfcro-Pof au edges
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g ^ Of While)

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iabels3.5" xl.5 (1 across)

Labels 4.0-X .5 0

labels4.0 It 1-5 (2across;

XmSOFT 3" discs l=w.

500

1000 20001
£9.50

£8.50 £1^95

£975 £14*95 £27v9!>

£16.95 £31*95

£5*25

£5.75

£5*75

£6.75

£4,75

£9*50

£10*50

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ue piping.

- T,^ „ MAXELL 3"discs (cased)

-N^iXTRASTO PAY

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Credit Card
Hotline (0256) 463507 Faxiine (0256) 8410181

Printer Ribbons

DMP 200CV3000 Black £2.95

DMP 2000/3000 Colours* £3.95

* Colours Available are:-
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Please help us to help you
Muiimiim Order £S

Pag&2e

Amsnad User March W89

Ages 2-5

Alphabet

Colours

Counting

House

Magic Garden

Matchmaker

Numbers

Pelican

Seaside

Snap

Ages 5-8

Balance
Castle
Derrick
Fred’s Wonls

Hilo

Maths Test
Mouser
Number Signs
Seawall
Super Spell

Ages 8-12

Anagram

Codebreaker

Dog Duck Corn

Guessing

Hangman

Maths Hike

Ntm

Odd Man Out
Pelmanism
Towers of Hanoi

Learning CAN be fun

• Each program has been
educationally approved
after extensive testing in
the classroom.

# Use your Amstrad to teach and amuse
your children at the same time.

• Three packages crammed full of
educational programs - and

so easy to use!

NUMBER SIGNS

PriouiiJe the correct arithmetic

sign and aim to score ten out of ten

BALANCE

Learn maths the fun Type in
the answer to balance the scales

HOUSE

Select the colours to draw a house
- hours of creutiiie entertainment

HANGMAN

Improue i^ur child’s spelling luith
this^n uersion of the popular game

ODD MAN OUT

Find the word that does not/it -
before your time runs out

PELICAN

Teach i?our chiidren to cross the
road sq/elv ot a Pelican crossing

Send to: Database Publications,
FREEPOST, Macclesfield,
Cheshire SKIO 4YB.

FUN SCHOOL

Aye 2-5

A ge S 12

6077/6078

m79/-6mf

6082/608:^

^Actd £I for E'iJTtipe *Add £2 for

. Order at any time of the dUiy or night ----

Telephofie Ordem:

Orders by Prpslel:

MieroLink-Telecom Gold

04il:^5 879920

Ke^ th«n 614308383

72:MAGOO]

Pa^Tneni: please indtcate mefbod !

I I Act ess; Mas^ercharge/Eu roca Jtl / BaicSaycardy'ViSd

CaTdNp. L_|_ i 1 i \ i i t i I, i i 1 >

\ 3 Cheque PO made payable to Dorabase PubJicatigns Ud

Name___— Signed-

Address___

Expiiy

Tel:

v U3

Please aihw wp to 14 for delivery

Oeo*®

SllB®®

Viotto®'*

T his program is designed to sliQW how one
picture can Iw transformed into another
with a smooth transition. Of coursOr the
easiest way would be to simply flick
between the two frames, but this is hardly
smooth, and definitely rtot pleasing to the eye.
What is needed is a series of frames to go in
between the originals, using a technique called
tweening to create a smooth animation
sequence.

The first frame we draw needs to be split up
into its component lines and re-assembled as the
second frame, One way of doing this would be to
use a conventional art package to draw each
frame by hand- This would be immensely time
consuming and not very mathematical.

The method k^etamorphosis adopts is to
assume that each fine in the first frame has a
partner in the second. Of course, if this were
literally true we would have the limitation'of both
frames reeding an identical number of lines,
which would make life very difficult. To get
around this, the computer makes the frame with
the most lines Frame I and the other Frame II.

Each line in Frame I is given a partner In Frame
II. When all the lines in Frame II have been used
up, the computer goes back to the start of this
frame again. In practice, a If this means^s that
some lines appear to c^verge on the same spot.

Once this process has been completed it is just
a matter of building up the frames in between.
Metamorphosis uses a complete cycle of eight
frames. TTierefore the distance between the two
points of a line and its partner is calculated and
divided by eight. This gives us a series of num¬
bers that are added on repeatedly to build up the
individual frames-

This may ail seem very complicated, but it is
completely transparent to the user. The only
details you are required to supply are the starting
and finishing frames.

On running the listing you will be presented
with a six-option menu;

# Create Design: Used for drawing your two
frames. Move the crosshairs with the cursor keys
and press the spacebar to plot the start and end
of each line. When you are satisfied with your
creation, press F and repeat the process for the
second frame. At any time you can return to the
main menu by pressing Q, This will not corrupt
the current design in memory, but will abort the
frames you were working on, Each frame may
consist of up to 64 lines.

• Animate Design; Once you've completed

Amsirad UserManch W89

Page 28

LIZTING

UZTIN6

[2^] GOTO M1B

Ce6l mi G0SU8 IfOBiLOCATE 1,1

[e?] 1050 PPirtT

[1A] 1060 nm *,r,1

[D7] 1070 PRINT EsR$(23) + CHpS(n
[d 2] 1080 (J(st + 2yc5=n;d(st-t3,tJ’)'

[fj] 1090 c=ctl:lf t=6i THtN RETURN
[63] 1100 ^dSUe l£00;fla^^0
[25] me IF lNKtHt?)>'1 THEN 1110
[!F4] r-£e IF )c=)t1 AND y=yt T«£K 9?0
CJD] 1130 IF fLa9"1 then HPVE ox,oy:l>
RAN x1,y1,1

LS21 1U0 If fLft^il THEN IttVE 0)i,oy:D

RAN ti'fA

[30 1150 G05U8 1200

[2J] 1160 HOVE x,2S6:0RAWR 0,‘126

[081 1170 H0VE l76,y:ItRAWR 2SA,0

[3E] 1100 *T=*:yT=y

[03] 1190 GOTO 920

[301 1200 ROVE )!l,2g6:0RAwR 0,-126,2
[9CJ 1210 ROVE l76,yl:»flAWR 234,0
[651 1220 RETURN
[8E] 1230 '

[91] 1240 ' Protes? Oat^

[94] 1250

[39] 1260 ELi-ljPEN 1
[32] 12T0 LOCATE 15,10
[13] 1280 PBINTTrocfsSin?'
tAA] 1290 LOCATE 15,12
fA9] 1300 PRINT' Osta'

[E63 1310 POKE 53FFf,123
[713 1320 IF cnuncn)>=count(2} THEN
1420

[11] 1330 FOR n1-0 TO 63
[00] 1340 FOR n2=0 TO 3
[AEI 1350 t=d(fi2,flU
[423 1360 dCn2,nn=dtri2+4,n1)

[A7] 1370 d{n^^,n1>M
[94] 1580 NEAT:NEXT
[HD] 1390 t^courtrll)

1993 1400 (ountCI)=countt2)

[3C3 U10 ttiuftt(2)n
[62] 1426 IF count(1)-COu'it(2J THEN 1
480

[751 1430 c=tourt{2)

[AA] 1440 FOR rtl5i:Qiint(2) TO countdl

520 RETURN
530

540 ' Cr^aie
550 ■

560 CLSiOOSUB 730

570 PEN 2:L0.tATE 12,17

560 PRINT CHR$(240);CHft'J{242J

590 PRINT (;HS«t2411::HftS(243)

600 PRINT" ' Hcvesienf

610 LOCATE 12,19

620 PRINT’SPACE - Plot lifle’

630 LOCATE 12,21

640 PRINT'F ■ Finish Frame'

550 LOCATE 12,23

560 PRINT’R - 4uit':PEN 1

670 FOR U\ TO 2

630 LOCATE 15,3

690 PRINT'frame ;';T

700 st=Cf41”4

710 GOSQS 350

720 countCf)=e

730 NEXT

740 PRINT CHRJ{25]+CHRS{0)

750 SOSOB 1240
760 0QSUB 1570
770 GOTO 70
730

790 ■ Ora« 60 )i

[Fl] 10 ■ Heiamor^hosi5
Cr2] 20 by Siiian
[F3] 30

[E2] 40 ON ERROR SOTO 90
[1191 50 GOCUB 400:GOSUB 2490
[F63 60 ■

[F73 70 ' Henu
[f8] 80 ■

[04] 90 PAPER 0:PEN 1:CL5
[E3] 100 LOCATE 18,3:PRINT’Mer.u"

t4B] 110 LOCATE 18,4:PfilNT--'

[37] 120 PEN 2

[F7] 138 LOCATE 12,7

tt5] 140 PfllNT'd) Create design"

[19] 150 locate 12,9

[7B] 160 P#!Nrf2) Aninate design'

[DS] 170 locate 12,11

Cf6] 180 PRlsrt3> Load design'

[F91 190 LOCATE 12,13

[F33 200 PRINT’CO Save design'

[0A3 210 LOCATE 12,15

[E63 220 PRINT'(5) CataLogue disc'

[2E] 230 LOCATE 12,17

[74] 240 PftiHT'(61 E*it program"

[541 250 PIN 1;L0CATE 12,20
[64] 260 PRlNT'GelccJ (1) to C6)-
EA2] 270 PEN 3;L0CATE 5,24
[643 230 PRlNT’By Simon listson';

[433 300 PAPER 0:PEN 1;CALL 3BB03
[59] 310 yJ^UPPERSClNKEYS)

[94] 320 IF il=”THEN 310

[E&] 330 i=A5Ctt31-48

[f6] 340 IF i<\ OS i>b THEN 310

[11] 350 ON I SOTO 548,1710,2050,2210
,2360,2430

[F4] 360 END
[B1] 370

IB33 380 Initialise

[@53 390

[AD] 400 RODE 1

[E5] 410 PAPER 0:BORDEP T

[£E] 426 INK 0,1:INK 1,24

[D5] 430 INK 2,13dNK 3,6

[12] 440 lflND0Wie1,l2,27,8,15
[00] 450 PEN 3:L0CAT£ 11,1

[70] 460 PRINT'** HETAHORPHOSIS **'
[96] 470 HiNDOU 1,80,2,25
[893 480 DIN (iC7,63)

[E53 490 c-t5000

[05] 500 FOR 0=1 TO fl:1<3tCn)ii:

[3C] 510 c=c+i800;Nt*T

310 NOVI 172,290

820 BRAWfi 262,0,5:0RAWR 0,-134

830 9RANR -262,0:DFANR 0,134

840 RETURN

850 ■

860 Draw Frame
870

830 CESs-1:flag=0:c=0
890 y=2B0:y=20B:!(1=*;yl=y
900 PRINT CHSI(231+CHS!$(n
910 GOSOS 1200

920 IF INKEI(0)>-1 AND y<286 THE
N y?y1*2

930 IF INK£T{2)>-1 AND y>160 THE
N y=y1-2

940 IF INSCETt8)>-l AND i>l76 THE
N x*ii1'2

950 If lN1t£lfCn>-1 AND x<430 THE
N x=xl+2

960 IF iNK£VC67)>d THEN 70

970 IF 1HKEYC53)=‘1 THEN 998

980 IF I3JKEY(53)'*1 THEN RETURN

ELSE 960

990 IF INKEY{47)=-1 THEN 1130
1000 If flag=1 THEN 1040
10*0 fLagsl;cix-*:Qy=y
1020 dCst+B,:)=x;dCst+1,c)-y

[81] 1450 FOR n2i4 TO 7
[30] 1460 dCfi2,nl)=(Jtn2,n1-c)

CP3J 1470 N£XT;NEXT
[AD] 1430 count = coufit{ 1)

[453 1490 FOR Ol=0 TO iaunt
[74] 1500 FOR n254 TO 7
[76] 1510 d(n2,n1)=C(JCrv2,n11-dCfl2'4
ni/7

[C6] 1520 NEXT:NEXr
[6E] i538 RETURN
[973 1548 •

option one, or loaded a previously saved design,
you can select this option. Your current design
will be animated before your very eyes at
medium speed. To see just what the program is
capable of, press 3 to select fast speed. If you
want to study the frames more closely press 1 for
slow speed. To reiurrt to the main menu press 0.
# Load design: Type in the filename - up to eight
characters - and press Return. The computer will

then attempt to load this saved design.

• Save design: Can he used to save your current
design to tape or disc, which can be recalled later
with option three. Again, the filename can be up
to eight characters long.

• Catalogue disc: Shows all the designs on the
disc in the current drive. Not available for tape.

• Exit Program; Returns the user to Basic. Note
that the Escape key is disabled throughout the

program. To get a fee! for the program, draw
something very simple the first time - say a
square at bottom left for Frame I and a square at
top right for Frame II.

The machine code data at line 2650 sets up two
bar commands, i STORE and. i RECALL. The s
(bar) character before these commands is typed
by holding down Shift and pressing the (u key,
which you'll find just to the right of the P key.

Amstrad User M3rch 1989

Page 29

EMPIRE

STRIKES

NEW ROYAL EDITION

il^TwO Liltrd sensitivi^
lire buttqn^
^9 ® Er^oncinitaily de»gn«d
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wirh ^Irang ^labiti-ging
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cartrol ^ On labte or ir hand
op«f alisn Cdm patible with

ZK Spactmrrr liK.m \2&K
CcHriiri(MJ*he M, Vic 20.
Afhstrad, Atari, etc.

^eetah^'--^ -

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^ijt'h * . .j _p*V ■'-fl Etatil highly Mn^iyt-li[jh? icucli HiCBdtWpTCHtS

+ rS Unique e*qr>nDrr«*CBllY de5Jigrw[jiCD»iE+xil handle-ASurfl in fillTO FIHE

""^CJ In^lcs-lrirfl'blE WttAL SHAFT %3 £tl«lDr ZGiwmcAar

^ ^ ^ Foi*! lira -9 12 mimhh ^^rranly Auloniartic Oqrvi?ririg

^-Higiii impdcl rntiuit tHdy dui^ Miih -»|rang jipbali^ing &iK.1iQn>ci.i^9'9 E'igh[ dirKii$Fi4ii

9 0'*1ab^ Q'' in h3nd£]rp#HiAli^n;lii^C4impAlitalB v^iih JJt Spfeirum 1Ck.

•1&4 i;^. if. 4}. Cvmm^idDFc ^i. Vic ZD. A^s^rad. Alvi «le

owtr

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^AUTO FWE \

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12 MONTH WARRANTY

W / The

Explosive Joystick

# Dehi^.iTcilMiSt con$tru(iticM.

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* HigiNvsamsiMw light touch Hiqno SWTCti
lifvtHJlIoiic. 9 6 ^ 10 * AUTO FmE function,

• Ergcnofiii&aaydasJtgnadconlFfll hand^ ifrilh
ndeflru^iabhE UETAI. SHAFT.

ri-«cFi ]■•■ jE»ri.|>ch cor^pAhb4» 791 ^p-f^iiiuYi im i.Rii ip^k n ^ # Air^iiiad cMn«ui*ri

* b< i ViC ZO C^rriiivi^r'^ 4- □ommactoi'* Ct^e a i^luA 4 Eampuii^-s ^HlJip^or %wl scq^ritEiyi

• 4i«ri 7tQO 4 4i#ri SJW VfiPto S-rili-ms ^ AiJ<> Marne- CorNflul-fi'^

ONLY

• Compatible Willi ZK Spectrum, ieh, 4 aii,l 2 Sh , + 2 ^ + 3 ,
CummcicItJfe $ 4 . Vk 20 . Amslrad. Atafi, ate.

4 Four aAlramaly sensitive fine tHitlons. |

• Uniquely stylad hand grip. J

* Auta fire swilch. # 12 moflthft waffanly. I

* +2 Selector Conned Iqt I

AJl50eC;nc oh-orncind D''C(n Sjpieciiachonge w-irrCut r^iC#
Pttcea inc lude VAT, poa-lage A pac ki ng
Delivery normally 14 darS f m _

E.iport eiders a1 no BHEfa CDSI I

OMier enKiuiries welcome ~ ^ |

Cheelih. produCia»w»fliibl a Irom Elf inches ot DIXOn«

UtfKW WHSMITH#

I **'^^^ fibres and allqoodi c-omputer

V/j V"—- —shops or direct from Cbeel^h.
i ^ CHEETAH MARK ETING LTD ^

Nfirburynbos*, hdbrtsurv Road^ \

Fairwater, Car-drN CF5 3AS.

Teilephone: Caiditf 555525 I

Tele A. 497455 Faj<: (02221 555527 M

Pag^30

Amstrsd User Msrch 19S9

[2B]

1790

LOCATE 15/19

[FA]

1800

PftlNr'2 - Nediun"

[9DJ

1810

lOCATE 15/21

[9E]

1820

PR1NT''3 - fast’

[C5]

1830

LOCATE 15/23

[DC]

1B40

P1!lNT"(i - fluTt'

[15]

1858

FOR f=l TO 8

[FE]

1868

iRECALL/iocH)

[89]

1870

GOSUB 1950LNEXT

[D4]

1880

GOSUB 1950;GO£ua >950

[43]

1850

FOS f -8 TO 1 STEP-1

[Et]

1900

IRECALI/Iocff)

[791

1910

G0SO8 1950:HEXT

C(4J

1920

GOSUS 1950:GOS11B 1950

E( 2 ]

1930

GOTO 1850

E9F1

1940

[A2]

1950

0 #Lay

tA5]

I960

[BF]

1970

FOR p=0 TO del

[273

1980

IF INKETt64)>-1 THEN del

[BE]

1990

IF 1NKET(65)>-1 THEN del

[64]

2800

IF INKET{57)>-1 then del

[59]

2810

IF 1NICET(67)>-1 THEN 70

[F3]

2020

[65]

2038

RETURN

[BE]

■

[91]

2858

' Lead Design

[94]

2068

[9A]

2070

(LStPEN 2

[ 66 ]

2088

LOCATE 13,10

[991

2090

INPUT'FiLenafle‘;f J

[7A]

2100

f$=HlSt(fS,1,81+\(fes’

[91]

2110

OPENIN ft

[At]

2120

INPUTlf9,count

[ 11 ]

2130

FOR n1=0 TO toufit'l

[45]

2140

FOR n 2=8 TO 7

[(El

2150

INPlJT#9/d(n2,n1)

C(B]

2160

NEXTiNEXT

[9F}

2170

CLOSEIN

[C?]

2180

GOSUB 1570

[16J

2190

GOTO 70

[ 86 ]

2200

■■

[89]

2210

Save Design

[80]

2220

[92]

2230

CLS:PEN 2

E5E]

2240

LOCATE 13/10

[91]

2250

tMPuT'Fi lefiane';ft

I 8 E]

2260

fl:HIDJ(f$,l/ 8 )*'',des'

[ 68 ]

2270

QPENOUT fi

r4E3

2280

NiflTE#?, count

[253

2290

FOR ri1=0 TO count-1

I3D3

2300

FOR n2=0 TO 7

2310

NSl7E49/d(n2,fin

rc3]

2320

NEXTiNEXT

[313

2330

CLOSEOUT

[ 00 ]

2340

GOTO 70

[973

2350

■

C9A]

2360

' CataEogue Siac

[9D]

2370

[951

2380

CLS;PEN 1

[S 6 ]

2390

a f nt=''* ,de s": SI R ,61 af nt

[A83

2400

NHILE INKETt='‘';WEND

[84]

2410

GOTO 78

[90]

2420

[93]

2430

' Exit Prograa

[961

2448

[CD]

2450

CALL 08(82

[F£]

2460

CALL &9B4E

[ 02 ]

2470

NOSE 2:END

[A2]

2480

■

[AS!

2490

' Hachine code loader

[ 8 C]

2500

[91]

2518

IF PE£lC(44t6()-132 THEN

URN

[EBl

2528

RESTORE 2658

[29]

2530

HENORf £3FFE:addr^£4080

t6S] 2540 F5R aX-2650 fC 2950 STEP 10
IA3] 2550 tctt3U0:FOfi nX=1 TO 12
141] 2550 READ bytes
{591 2570 byte=VALC’8'>bytei)

[7C] 25B0 cliksch*4-byte
[84] 2590 POKE addr.byte
[F4] 2600 addf^addrtl
[FE] 2610 totil=totaL+byte:*JEKT bS
[941 2620 READ clikS;ctik=VAL("EHchkS}
[FDl 2650 IF thRototal THEN PRINT’Er
ror in Li(ie';aS:END
[EF] 2640 NEXT alSiCAlL 84000:RETURN
[6B] 2650 SATA 21,0a,40,01,0«>0,«d,d
1 /be yc9,00,00,5(id

[31] 2660 SATA 00,00,l6,40,cJ/22,40,t
3,41,40,55,54,56f

[561 2670 SATA 4f,52,15,52,45,45,41 ,4
c:,c:,00,f e,01/49B

[E2] 2680 SATA C0,2t,46,c2/dd,56,01,d
d,5a,00,06/20/47e

tC6l 2690 SATA 0e,40/c5/e5,7e/12,23,1
5,10,fa,e1/01/4aa

CAD 2700 SATA 00,08/09/50/04,01,50,C
0,09/Cl,0d,20/24d

[283 2710 SATA e9/C9/fe/01,c0,dd,56,0

l/dd/Se/00,21,601

[FE] 2720 SATA 46/c2/06,20,0e,40/c5/e
5/13/77,25/13,led

[C0] 2730 DATA 10/fa/«1/01,00/08/09,3
0/04/01/50,c0,342

[AF] 2740 DATA 09/Cl,0d,20,e?,c9,0a,0
0/33/20,1c,ff,498

[B1] 2750 data If,00,2d,00,14,00,06,0
3,00,70,61,70/108

[52] 2760 SATA 63,6f,ec,ef,0e,01,0d,1
8,00,69,6e,6b/423

rE6] 2770 SATA 63,4f,ec,ef,19,13,01,0
d/22,00,6c,e6/462

CAA] 2780 SATA ef,19,03,20/20,20,20,2
0,20,20,00,37/229

[IB] 2790 SATA 00,1e,00,ad/20,0f,01,8
2,20,0d,03,00/164

E4F] 2800 DATA 70,61,70,63,6f,ec,01,a
2,20,0e,2t/D(j/4a9

[6F1 2810 SATA 0a,00,70,61,70,63,6f,e
c,01,a2,20/0f/3db

ECF] 2320 data 2c,0d/1S,00/69,6e,6b,6
3,6f,et/01/32/3f4

[7D] 2830 DATA 20,10/2c/t9/15,00,11,0
0,22/01/38/20,186

[09] 2840 SATA 22,21/52/45,4c,22,2t,1
c,00,20/00,1f,1cf

[6C] 2850 DATA 00/2t,01,£5,20,54,68,6
9/73/20/65,61,38e

[Cfl] 2860 DATA 6i/6c,20,6e,65,76,65,7
2/20,72/65,74,483

[Cf] 2870 DATA 75,72,66,73,21,00/37,0
0/36,01,85,20,273

[11] 2880 DATA 1c,00,20,2c,0d/00/00/6
8/61,73,68,65,27#

[7B] 2890 DATA f3/2c,0d,00,00,74/61,6
f,6c,f3,2c,0d,416

[0B] 2908 SATA 18,80,69,6e,6b/63/6f,e
C/2C/0d,0a,00,35D

[D5] 2910 SATA 70,61,70,63,6f/ec,2t,0
d/22,00,6c,e6,43C

[66] 2920 SATA 00,80,00,00,00,50,41,5
0 43 4f tc 04 243

[6r] 2930 'SATA 00,00,00,00/00/00,00,4
9 4« 4b 43 47 174

[59] 2940'sATA cc, 04,00,00/00,50,35,0
0,0O,4c,c6,04/2bD

[37] 2950 SATA 00,00,00,20/84,00,00,0
0,00,00,00,00/034

[S8]

[58]

[B3]

[93]

[F?]

[241

[61]

[0A]

[2F]

[CBl

[82]

' Store Frai»#s

(LS:G0SU5 780

FOR f^O TO 7

FOR n=0 TO coufit'l

*1=a(0/n>iy1=d[1,n)

ii2=tit2/n):y2:(i(3/n)

d*t=d{4,n)idy1=d(5/n1

(iy2=d(6,nJ :dy2=d77,n1

HOVE Klt(di{1*fl,yl + Cdyt*f)

SRAVj x2+td*2*f)/y2Kdy2*f)/

JlEXr

iST0RE/lQt(7t1)

CLS)f1:NEKT

RETUNN

Ariimatian

1590
1608
1618
1620
1630
1648
1658
1

1668
1670
1680
1690
[SF] 1780
E921 1710
E95] 1720

[(41 1730 CtS:SOStlB 788
[8S] 1740 deL=10:

[83] 1750 P£« 1:tOCATE 16,3
[48] 1760 PfiINrAniB3tion"
[94] 1770 PEN 2:L0CATE 15/17
[12] 1780 PfilNri ' SLo«"

LfZTING

Amstrad Usef March 1989

Page 3 J

Fun Schaat 2 for contains:

UanUti^^

neverbeen

4uch flM'

DATABASE

EDUCATIONAL

SOFTWARE

9 Number train: Catcuiations made enjoyable

• Shopping: Which shops for which products?

• Maths Maze: Fun improving arithmetical skills

• Treasure Hunt: ir^trodacrion to coordinates

• Bounce: Get to grips with angles

• Packing: Discover tesseiating shapes

• CaterpHlar: Word buUding challenge

• Number Jump: Have fun practising tables

• Build a Bridge: Shape-fitting challenge

• Passage of Guardians: Enjoy anagrams
9 Unicorn: First steps in problem solving

• Logic Doors: Mapping made easy
9 Souvenirs: An introduction to travel

9 Code Boxes: Discover binary arithmetic
9 Mystery machine: Have fun breaking codes
9 Escape: A final check on progress

You can give your children an unfair
advantage with Fun School 2 - it's
the idea) way to introduce youngst^r^
to the joys of using computers..

Detailed instructions are supplied
with each pack giving educational
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A computer is an ideal teachinp tool for young
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Fun School 2 is available for three age
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Now children can enjoy using their parents'
computer while they learn at their own pace.

9 Shape Snap: Colourful shape recognition
9 Find the Mole: Experiment with number sizes
9 Teddy Count: Ideal introduction to numbers
9 Write a Letter: Creative fun at the keyboard
9 Colour Train: Piay at spotting colours
9 Pick a Letter: Word building made easy
9 Sped a Word: Ertjoy naming the pictures
9 Teddy Bears Picnic: Move around a maze

Fun School 2 for Under^Bs contarns:

Fun School 2 for 6 to B year olds contains:

ORDER FORM

supply Fun School 2 on □ laps at £9 95* □ 3ir> disc at £12.95*
Fqr^gas; □ Un^$r-€$ D 6 - 6 yeai'& □ Ovoi'-9$

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PROGRA/ISMINS

PROHUUHilS

suRsn

W ELCOME ones again to
ths part of ACU that
gives programmers a
chanoe to polish up
their coding techniques. Are you
having problems using the second
64l( in your 8128 for data storage?
Simon Palmer from Scarborough is.
He has explored the Bankmanager
commands fully, but cannot get the
required result.

At the moment Simon stores lines
of data like this:

Ion Sharpe gets to grips with
your programming difficulties

ia l>*TA 2!,1t,B?,£),37,79/39,d,F,2,0,M

He then analyses them one line at a time with
Basic commands like:

REAS either

J,ctlS,clrl,tl

20 IF THEN GOSUB 100 ELSE 10

Me knows now that the variables needn't ail
have a $ after them, but didn't at the time he
wrote the program. Simon says he can rectify
that once he has solved his main problem,

What he wants to do is use the first 64k for
holding the Basic program and the second 64k to
hold the lines of data. Each item in the line of data
doesn't always have the same number of digits,
for example s$ may be 12 in one line and 34B in
another.

Simon's question is: Csn i use the second 64k
for storing my lines of data? If so, how do I get the
data into the Other bank of ram and then access it
one line at a time?

Well, the Basic found on the 6128 is pretty
much the same as that on the 464 with a few
additions and enhancements. As the 464 doesn't
have an extra 64k, the Basic interpreter isn't writ-
ten to handle any more memory than the stand¬
ard 40k or so. Therefore on a 6128 if you want to
access the extra 64k you have to call upon a
program which acts as a go-between one like
Bankmanager.

The second 64k may be used in a variety of
ways, offers a solution to Basic programs which
have outgrown the main memory pool. The trou¬
ble 1$ that if you don't want to use Bankmanager
you need some other machine code program¬
ming to let you make best use of it.

If the way Simon presented his problem is the
full story, Bankmanager can probably be used to
solve it if he was to adapt his program to suit.
Before going into detail though, this is a good
excuse to look at the whole area of Basic pro¬
grams that are too big to fit into 40k.

You can go through the program looking for
shorter ways of achieving the same results,
shortening variable names, cutting down on

remove these blocks from the main
program and store them on disc.
They are all given line numbers
which start at the same point, and
when a block is needed you can
merge it in to the main program
before it is GOSliBed to,
instead of subroutines, these pro¬
gram blocks can easily be data lines.
Here is a short example of how this
would work. Save the first two pro¬
gram segments as weday.'l and
cverlayZ and then run the main
program;

RE Ms, using integer variables where possible
and using multi-statement lines. There are lots
more of these tricks of the trade, but they tend to
make a program less readable and can only be
taken so far.

One useful technique that can solve the prob¬
lem at a stroke is known as overlaying. A properly
structured program has clearly defined sections
to do specific jobs.

You can imagine a menu on which are six
items where the user has to press a rtumber to
Indicate the one he wants. The routine that prints
the menu and gets the user's selection wilt be a
self-contained block. Each selection will have a
corresponding block of its own, which should, as
far as Is possible, be independent of the others.

Now if the blocks are independent, only one
can be in use at any one time, meanwhile the
others are sitting around doing rtothing except
taking up memory. On a disc-based machine -
tapes are too slow for this method - you can

100 ' f Ue over lay. 1
110 JATA 1r2,3,4,5

100 ' fUe overlay.?

110 DATA 6„7,8,9,10

10 ' main pro^rAi

20 CHAIN nERGE'overlayJ',30

30 SOSUB 70

it CHAIN HEftG£'overlay,2',S0
50 QOSbB 70

60 m

70 ' read the data

80 FOR i=1 TO 5:«EAD jiPRINT jiNEXT
90 RETURN

So far so good, I hope. Although this is a pow¬
erful technique, it does have drawbacks. Firstly, if
the merge operations are within a loop, Basic
forgets where it la and will report an unexpected
NEXT or WEND. You can use GOTO to get around
that one.

The other snag is speed, or lack of it-the time
taken to load a program segment may be un¬
acceptable. There are programs around which
allow the second 64k to be set up as a 64k disc
drive. You would copy the overlays into it at the
start of a session, and being ram instead of a
physical disc drive with moving parts, merging
would be a lot quicker.

Some file copying utilities will not work with a
ram or silicon disc, so the way to accomplish the
copy is to make sure the overlays are saved in
Ascii format. That wav you can copy the file using
Basic like this:

10 OPENirA:overlay.!'
20 OPENUun:over Lay. V
30 UHILE NOT EOF
40 LINE INPUTtt9/at
30 PRINT#9,d£

60 VEND
70 LLOSEIN
80 closeout

where overlay. 1 is the filename of an overlay, and
the second 64k has bean set up as drive C.
Programs that allow you to set up a silicon disc

Page 34 .

Amstrad User March 1989

(ike this are the Dk'tronics silicon disc or
Romantic Robot's Rodos rom, which will require
a fom board. Or may be lucky enough to
come across a public domain program to do the
job. There used to be one on Mi era net as tele-
software.

The copying technique I've just illustrated
leads to another possible solution to Simon's
problem; Just save your data on disc in a file and
read it in as needed. That way it isn't part of the
program, so it takes up no room until you start
putting it in variablest

Write a program^ or use a word processor to
strip off the line numbers and DATAs. Assuming
you have a series of such lines in a file called
datafile, it can be read like this:

OPENIN"datafih“

WHILE NOT EOF
INPUW,d$,mS,y$,s$ etc...
IF )/GbS<a5 GOSUB WO
WEND
CLOSEfN

Alternatively set up some string arrays to hold
the data and read it from disc into the arrays.
Data held in this way takes up less room than
when it is included in the program as data lines
because there are na line numbers or DATA key¬
words.

Having covered those possibilities, we'll turn
our attention to Benkmanager, which has the
overwheimirtg advantages of being free, able to
hold a lot of information, and, once primed with
data, very quick. What you can't dg is use it to
store lines of Basic - you must use it in a similar
way to datafiie.

Commercial break

Are you baffled by your extra SAk? Would your
manual make more sense if it was written in '
Sanskrit^ Then buy the incredible CPC
Computing back issue bundle and read Ian
Sharpe's epic three-part series on Bankmanager.
Only £9.9B on all good mail order forms.

Surgery Part II

The oniy problem I can see is that individual
items of data aren't the same length on different
lines, but if you're prepared to trade off a less
than totally-efficient use of space in the second
64k for getting something working, this rieedn'l
be too much of a hindrance.

In essence, Bankmanager stores strings one
after the other - like train carriages, where each
seat is a character position. What you need to do
is convert the information in your data lines into a
form Bankmanager can handle. You can do this
by adding all the items on a line together to make
one string that can be broken down again when
you want to process it.

The thing to do is look at each item of data and
decide on the maximum number of characters it
can occupy. Add these figures together to get a

PROGRAMMING

maximum length for the entire line ignoring
commas, line number and the DATA keyword.

Each carriage is known as 3 record and, like a
train, not all seats in a carriage need be filled. If
the maxirnum length of the first item of data in a
line is three characters, allocate the first three
seats to It, even if in some cases only one or two
seats will be filled The second item will always
start at position four, and will always occupy, say,
the next two seats even if only one character is
involved. Unfilled seats will be padded with
spaces for convenience.

Taking two example lines, hem's how they'd
translate into strings suitable for storing with
Bankmanager

10 niP, ;3,11,32.D,37,79,

2i HATA 111,4,

II,UN

21 11S2&37 7y39HF2 0 N

1114 55M 303 55WFl00t0NN' _

Here I've assumed that the longer data items
are the maximum length permissible. Notice how
each lirre has become shorter? If there isn't much
variation between the average length of a data
item and its maximum si;e, even with spaces as
padding you can cram more data into a given
amount of ram.

You can see that although the items have been
run together into something almost
incomprehensible, each item has a known place
in the string - what was yS always occupies pos¬
itions six and seven, for example. What you need
to know, therefore, is:

f How do you easily convert your existing data
into this format and store it on disc?

9 How do you load it from there into the extra
ram?

9 How do you get if out again and split it down
into d$, m5, and so on?

As your data lines are quite long, from here on
I'm going to use some hypothetical shorter data
so the examples are less unwieldy:

I 1000 Bill,?,3,4

1010 DtUA Harold,12?,100,40

There are four items on each lirre, and the
maximum length of each is six, three, three and
two, respectively. These will become:

Bill M 4
Haro ldtJ21004G

Assuming there are dozens of such lines and
we don't want to do the conversion manually, we
cart write a short utility to do it:

Readirig the resulting file into the extra ram is a
bit easier. Once you have Bankmanager installed,
each line can be processed like this:

100 ' read data into second fi4k
105 ■

' 110 tines=0:lin.elength-14:err(OdelI=0
120 iBANK4P£N,tineLetigth
130 OPENlN'ditafite"

140 NHILE NOT EOF

150 INPUTS?,datalinel

160 ;ekNKNltlTE, > errcode!:,dataLi nei

170 Lines=lines+1

180 NENS

190 CLOiEIN _

The variable /fnes keeps a count of the number
of data lines read in, so you know when to stop
when reading them back out again. I haven't put
in any error checking here, so I'd mug up on
Bankmanager before using it in anger.

Finally, to read each item sequentially and
break it down yO'U need something along the
lines of this:

200 rOfl i=l TO 4:REJ15 l«ngth(i):litrel
en^th=listtensti|tLfngth[i) iNEXT
210 SATf 4,JJ,2
220 FOR i=1 T« lines
230 l0XNItl!E*[i,@ errC0<stS,<SJtaLir,eS,i-1
240 60Sition=1

I 250 tu«U=N10H(ietaLineSjPositi{)ri,Lt
n?th(11);PfiINT itemtS
240 poBition^UOiition+lengthtl)

270 Ttf!ii2J=0IDS(dit3tineJ,pO3ition,le
ngtht2));PnNT iteftfJ
260 p03.ition-p4SitionrLen9t!i(2)

290 ite(i3i'N!l}S(datalinek,9«siti«n,[e
flgth(3)):PRINT iteaSS
I 300 pipsitiw-positionH«ngtlv(3)

310 Tteiii4S=(1IlS(d»taLifit3,poBitipri,U
nSth(4));PRlNT iceii4l

320 NEXT__^

It would be a lot rieater to make item$ an array
of four strings and use a loop to break dafa/ffreS
down, but you get the idea. The f-f after the
IBANKREAD command tells it which record you
want - they're numbered from zero.

When a record has been read the next read or
write operation automatically acts on the next
record, making the f-f redundant for sequential
access. However, if you add the last two pro¬
grams together at the end of the disc reading
operation Bankmanager will be pointing at the
end of the file, so for the first read the pointer
must be restored to zero. You can accomplish the
same thing with another iBANKOPEN, line-
length before reading commences.

109 ' creata data fi le
105 ■

110 FOR 1=1 TO 4:RiAD Lsngthfi): Lice t
fngth=Line length* leegthfi1;NEXT

120 bhU 6,3,3,2
130 CPENPilT'datafile'

U0 fOk i=1 TO 2 'nuBber of lines
150 data linei'-SPACESf Line length)

160 position=1

170 FOR i = 1 TO 4 'no pf itens on line

1EB READ item!

19B HID$(dataLineS,position) = itej(iI
290 ppsitisn=position+Lengthtj)

210 NEXT

220 PRINT#?,datalinek

230 NEXT

240 CLOSEOUT

1090 DATA 8iU,2,3,4

1010 &ATA Harfltd,l22,100,40

AmsTrgd User Marcii 1989

Page 35

F ollowing Bob Hobday's request in the
December issue for information about
how to print the pound sign on his Quen-
data printer, I have been sent a couple of
letters to tell me that there is a suitable daisy-
wheel, a Qume compatible one, called Uk Ascii,
which has a part number of 82286. Others are
available under the name of England Series.

There is, howeverj a slight disadvantage in that
the pound sign replaces the hash sign, So the
hash is printed as a pound, which makes Basic
listings look a bit strange.

The reason for this switch around is that the
CPC has a 7 bit printer port, with the result that
when the Ascii code for the pound -163 - is sent
to the port, the eighth bit, with a value of 128, is
stripped off, so the printer receives the code 35
(163 - 128 = 351, which would normally be the
hash symbol, but in the case of Ertglish daisy-
wheels is a pound.

Mow we know why Amslrad chose to allocate
an Ascii value of 163 to the pound and only
provide a 7 bit printer port.

Skywave RS232 interface

Derek Pinches from Surrey
uses his modem for
communicating with Tele¬
com Gold. He has it
interfaced to his CPC with
one of the old and long out
of production Skywave Multiport interfaces.
Derek was told that the interface is a full specifi¬
cation RS232 unit, but now finds that when he

tries to run the CPfM Mex communications pro- i
gram it will not even recognise that a serial port is
connected.

Welt the Skywave is a full RS232 interface; the
problem is that the addresses it uses are not the
same as those used by CPfM, which is why CP/M
does not recognise it. As the interface was ,
originalty supplied with its own comms software
- written- in Forth, incidentally - this was no
problem.

In theory it ought to be possible to patch CP/M
so that it will communicate with the Skywave
interface, but I have beerr unable to find out any
information about the addresses it uses. The
manufacturer is no longer available to provide
support. I

I fear that if Derek wants to use CP/M-based
comms software he will find it easier and
certainly a lot quicker to boy another interface
that does work with CP/M. The Pace/Amslrad
interface, the original Amstrad interface and the
old Honey Soft interface are all directly compat¬
ible with CP/M without modification.

More on Cash Trader

Greg Egan from Staly-
bridge has written in reply
to my request for anyone
else who has been having
trouble with Cash Trader.

While Greg finds the pro¬
gram to be impressive, he has also experienced
similar problems to Brian McIntosh and has

received the same response from IT Marketing,
He is no nearer to a solution, other than the fact
that Cash Trader appears to work correctly as
long as only a couple of entries are made.

Greg's current solution to the crashing prob¬
lem is to switch off and re-load the program
before continuing.

Foreign accents with Protext

Alan Lea of Leamington
Spa uses Protext, or to be
precise, his wife does. She
uses it to type Spanish and
Portuguese and is short of
an acute accent. Between
tfiem the Leas have managed to nearly produce
the correct accents by re-defining a control code
to "backspace" and then printing an apostrophe
on top of the previous character. But the end
result is only partially successful, Alan wants to
know how else he can do it, and also how the
character can be displayed on screen.

Unforturtaiely he does not say what make of
printer he has, but most machines allow you to
redefine characters - this subject was fairly well
covered in our July 1988 issue. Once the charac¬
ters have been designed, they can easily be
loaded into the printer from within a Pretext
document by making use of the >oc stored
command to output codes.

The best arrangement is to save a special
template containing all the required sequences of
commands.

Screen characters can be redefined in the

Page 36

Amstrsd User Msfch 1989

I _/

cumc

Protext loader program by making use of th'e
SYMBOL AFTER and SYMBOL commands. It is
also possible to redefine what keys serve what
purpose from within the loader program by
making use of die KEY Off command.

A good read of these commands in the CPC
manual and a bit of experimentstion should
make things obvious, if a variety of different con¬
figurations are needed, a simple Basic mertu can
be created to select which definitions are needed
before finally loading Pretext.

Juki6100 problems and Protext

John Gratton from LiV'
erpool hasaJukiBIOOprin-
ter and uses it with his 6128
and Pretext. He has been
unable to get it to print
a nyth i ng so fa r, a nd war ts
to know whether tiiis is a common problem.

No. it isn't a common problem. I used my 6128
with a JukiBlOO printer and Protext for a long
time with no problems at all. I also know several
other people with the same arrangement.

John does not say whether trouble only arises
when he is using Protext, or whether the printer
refuses TO print at all when connected to the 6128,
The simple way to check whether the printer
works is to load a Basic program and type
U$TM Alternatively, typing PRINT#8,"Hel!o
World" should have the expected result. If not,
the fault is with the printer, the cable connecting
it, or, less probably, the printer port on the 6128,

if the printer works from Basic but not from
within protext, the problem can only be one of
something being set up incorrectly within
Protext.

John does not say which version of Protext he
is using, but from his letter i get the impression
that he is using the GP/M Plus version. If so, then
configuration for a specific printer requires
several changes.

• The Set? rinter Driver option in CONFIG should
be configured so that the 6128 option contains
the required driver name.

• The J JKI6100-PTR driver should be loaded into
SBTPRINT and the printer type must be set to
parallel in the Set Printer Options, if it isn't
already.

• The control code interpretatiort setting in
SETPRINT's Set Printer Options should be set to
send.

• The save option in SETPRINT should be used to
save the modified driver,

• It is important to copy the modified
PROTEXT.CFG and JUK1610Q.PTR drivers on to
the disc from which Protext is loaded. Generally
the CONFIG and SETPRINT programs will be on
the reverse side, or a separate disc.

When Protext is next loaded the status line
should show that the JUKI6100 driver is loaded
and also that the port is PAR. It not, something
has still not been configured correctly and a fur¬
ther check should be made. Typing LCFG
JUKI6100 should result in the above messages
being displayed. After that, all should work
correctly,

Digitised pictures

Andrew Rush from
Rochdale has recently
bought Slop Press and
wants to make his own
digitised pictures for use
with it. He already has a
video recorder and wants to know what else he
needs in the way of hardware and software.

The only other he needs is a video digitiser.
One that I know works well is Vidi from Rombo
Productions I0SO6 390461, It retails at £89-95, hut

Joy Sharp of ftombo ProdMtioPS,
capjursd by the Vitli virieo digidsv

I've seen it advertised by Wacci (01'696 73221 for
as little as £68-

All the software needed to capture images is
provided - it i$ only necessary to connect the
video recorder to the digitiser box and run the
software. AlternaTively, images can be captured
directly from a video camera connected to the
digitiser.

Supercalc II

Charlie Jones from Cariisle
uses CP/Wl on his 6128 and
also has a 266k ram pack.

He wants to know why he
is still limited to Supercalc
II spreadsheet files of only
about 35k when all that memory should be
available.

The reason for this is that the ZSO processor is
only capable of addressing a maximum of 64k of
memory without trickery like switching banks of
memory in and out. CP/M Plus is only capable of
using about 61k. By the time Supercalc II has
loaded, all that is left is about 35k. There is noth¬
ing that can be done to access the remaining
memory.

For mast programs the addition of the 256k

ram expansion is a waste rjf time because virtu¬
ally alt CPC programs are written, at best, to make
use of the standard 128k memory available on
the 6128, Many do not make use of anything
except the first 64k- If you want to make use of the
extra memory, you will have to write your own
programs to do so.

Upgrading

I have had several requests
from people for advice
about upgrading their com¬
puter, Some have been
from people considering a
computer for the first time,
while others are CPC owners who are wondering
whether they should upgrade to one of the newer
16 bit machines,

I always find it very hard to advise new buyers
for the reason that often they have no real idea of
what they want the computer for. Usually it is for
the kids to use as well as for thent to do a bit of
word processing or process small business
accounts.

In most cases I recommend the CPC because it
is one of the few computers capable of running
business applications - end well established
ones at that - as well as having a wide range of
games software and a small, but passable, range
of educational software. More importantly, most
of the software is available at very reasonable
prices-

My answer to people looking at the 16 bit
machines is to ask them whether they cannot do
what they want with their CPC, If they can't, often
because the volume of data is so large that it
cannot be handled without a hard disc, there is
little alternative.

On the other hand, if they just want a change,
then so be it. Bui it is worth bearing in mind that
the cost of buying an Amiga is only a part of the
story. Work out what it will cost to replace all
your existing software with the more expensive
16 bit programs before making a final decision.

For anyone using their computer for work,
there are also the considerations of how much
time it wil! take to learn these new programs and
the difficulty of transferring data from one
machine and program to another. ’tUdA

Applications Advice i$ a regular monthly
column which answers queries and problems
connected with the use of serious applica¬
tions software and hardware.

When writing, please give full details of the
model of CPC and any accessories connected
to it, the version number of the program that
is causing the problem, and a futi description
of what is happening. Scribbled notes along
the lines of "...and my computer wort't print
anything..,'' make it a difficult ta give a
sensible answer.

Please do not enclose a stamped addressed
envelope - David Foster can only answer let¬
ters via this column. Write to David at:
Applications Advice, Amstrad Computer
User, Focus Magazines, Greertcoat House,
Francis Street, London SWIP18G,

^ User March W89

Pgg0 37

HARDWARE

Back to the
hard stuff

Phil Craven shows you how to have two
computers available at the flick of a switch

I AM often asked if it is possible to convert a
CPC into a different modei, complete with
the new model's system rom. The answer is
yes. To turn a 4fi4 into a 6128, for instance,
you will need an extra 64k of memofy, a DDI^I
disc drive with interface and a 6128 chip.

The first two items in that list are easy. The
memorv expansion i$ sold by Ram Electronics
(0252 8500851 the DDI-1 by the Jser Club
(001-510 S787K Yer buys 'em and yer plugs 'em
in.

The 6128 rom, on the other hand, presents a
problem. Some machines were made with the
system rom fitted in a socket on the main board,
in which case it is a simple matter to pull it out
and change it for the 6125 version. But most were
made with the chip soldered to the board. To
change these would need track cutting and
soldering, or the original rom de-soldered and
replaced. Not a job for the sgueamish.

To overcome this problem, I have come up
with the ACU Rom changer widget which will
allow you to fit the 6125 rom to your 464 or 664,
or vice versa, without ever having to open your
computer. You'll be able to switch between the
two systems at will, and yellow and green LED
indicators will keep you informed as to which
system is operative.

How (t works

If switched'in on power up, the circuit will not
allow the internal system rom to be enabled,
electrically replacing it with the external system
rom. It all fits neatly Into a small box which
pushes on to the 50-way edge connector, giving
easy access to the switch and reset button.

Reset button? Vup. While I was about it I
decided to include s button, the pressing of
which will give an early morning start (EMS) type
reset. It is useful for those occasions when the
Ctrl/Shift/Esc method doesn't work. The reset

button wilt do the job without the need to power
down. The whole thing is rounded off with a
through connector for adding the disc drive and
other peripherals.

The CP(i provides us with a line on the 50-way
expansion connector, called ROMDIS with which
wecandisablethe internal system rom. With the
switch SWI in the down position - seethe circuit
diagram in Figure I - ROMDIS is sent to a logical
high and the internal rom is completely disabled.

The external rom, being wired up exactly as the
internal one, now becomes the operating system
in use. With SWI in the up position the opposite
happens. The high disabling line Is fed to the
externa! rom and the internal system is allowed
to operate. It's as simple as that

There Is one small thing that we have to allow
for, the fact that we are not the only ones who
might want to disable the system rom. Other
roms send ROMDIS high when they are active -
we must ensure our external rom Intercepts this
signal and is disabled when it happens. This we

do by redirecting the through connector's
ROMDIG line through our circuit before going
into the computer. Both system roms then
receive the signal and whichever one Is active at
the time wid be disabled.

Diodes D1 and 02 are there to prevent the high
lire from 5v getting out to other peripherals. D3
and D4 are green and yellow LEDs to indicate
which system rom is in use, The arrowheads on
the left of the circuit diagram represent the com¬
puter's expansion socket connections; those on
the right represent the through connector's.

Ail 50 expansion socket lines are autorr>aticaliv
connected for peripheral use when the through
connector is fitted, but only those which are used
in the circuit are shown. The lines to the left of the
rom with the numbers 8 and 15 next to them
represent the eight data lines and the 15 lines of
the address bus. This is the standard way of
showing multiple lines in circuit diagrams. SW2
is a push button which resets the computer by
grounding the RESET line.

Page 38

Amstratf User March 7969

mmm-

f. _,

ARDWAR£

■

Construction

Before we start let me point out that dotted lines
in the wiring diagram are connectioris on the
underside of the board, and solid tines are
topside corrections.

The first job is to make the board fit inside the
box by cutting away ell four comers and sanding
enough from the two edges opposite the num¬
bers and Setters to allow the board to rest com-
fortably on the two central protrusions inside the
box. Next cut out the square hole in ^e board, as
indicated in Figure li, so that SW2 can poke
through it.

Now ail the components except SW2 can be
fitted to the top, non-coppered side of the board.
Figure It shows the precise locations for each. Do
not do any wiring at this stage.

First solder all legs of the 23-pin socket to the
board It should have an equivalent indicator to
the half moon shape shown in Figure II, which
should be positioned as Indicated. If It has a
centre cross member, then solder the resistor

and capacitor, any way round, flat to the
underside of the board, Otherwise they will fit
nicely inside the socket on the top side. Use their
long legs to connect them to the socket's pins,
indicated by the dotted lines.

Fit SWt, which will need its corner legs broken
off by repeatedly bending them with pliers so
that it will fit flush against the board. Figure II
shows a large and a small shape inside each of
the D3 and D4 tEOs - you can see these kind of
shapes in the LEDs themselves. The larger area in
each LED needs to be on the left, as drawn.

Slowly bend each LED's legs at right angles
using pliers, just below the fat part, so that they
wilt locate in their correct holes arid poke through
the top of the box. Solder them so that they stand
vertically and their fronts are in line with the front
ofSW1.

When they are soldered in, bend the left leg of

D3 and solder it to pin 22 on the rom socket. The
other three legs can be cut or broken off.

Diodes D1 and D2 must be soldered the correct
way round. One end of each is marked with a
heavy black or coloured band. The equivalent
band is shown in Figure II. When soldered, the
bottom ends can be bent over and joined
together; the top ends can be broken or cut off.

The last two components to fit are the edge and
through correctors. The edge connector is the
part which connects to the computer. It is impor¬
tant to fit it so that its main body is 8mm to 9mm
from the board else it will not connect properly to
the computer, When all 80 legs are soldered they
must be corrected to the through connector, but
first cut off leg 43 - ROMDfS - from the underside
of the board. It must be soldered to the board, but
not carried through.

Finally the through connector can be soldered

to the edge connector, as in Figure IV. Pre bend
the legs and allow plenty of solder to run
between the connectors, I find that using a vice is
a good method of neatly bending all the legs In
one go.

All that's left now is to doctor the box and wire
everything up, You can see that the box needs a
slot In the back for the through connector, a vwde
slot in the front for the edge connector, some
slots or holes in the top for SW1 and the LEDs,
and a hole in the back for the reset button, SW2.

The slot in the back, about 8mm from the
bottom of the outside and 6mm wide, is the first
one to do. The method I used was to drill a 6mm
hole about If.5mm up, somewhere near the
middle. From that I cut the slot with a junior
hacksaw blade.

The assembly will now fit into the box as far as
the LEDs and SW1. Mark and cut out recesses for
these, but only as deep as the parts themselves -
about &mm. You could even drill 5mm holes for
the LEDs to make them a bit tidier.

While we are working on the main box unit,
convert the screw hole at the back, the orre
behind the square hole on the board, irrtoa larger
hole ™ about 7mm diameter - ready for SW2.

Since the edge connector is as wide as the box,
the box lid can be modified In one of four ways.
The easiest Is to cut ^e bottom off and leave it
off. Next easiest is to cut It into two pieces,
leaving a gap for the connector, and screw them
both on. The third is to cut the top to fit and cut a
recess out of the bottom so that the bottom part
has a thin strip up each side of the edge connec¬
tor. This was the method I chose.

The last and best way is to keep It in one piece
by cutting a wide slot in the same way as was
done for the through connector. This is the only
way that all four corner fixing screws will work
efficiently, The top edge of the slot should be
34mm from the top of the box, and the bottom

Amstrad User Muncfy WS9

Page 39

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dividends of shares, unit tnisls etc. Current share prices can be entered very
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indeKCS etc. can be reconded, listed and plotted along with moving averages.
Practioe buying and selling shares. See if your intuition is right,

PORTFOLIO MANAGEMENT

^ Record full details of your portibliDs of stocks^ shares, unit trusts etc.

* Practice buying and selling and accura[ely rec^ your progress.

* Up to fifty shares per folio. As many folios as you like.

* Buy and sell shares with automatic calculation of dealing costs.

* Ten sets of deal! ng costs which you can alter as necessary.

* Record dividend yicids and price earnings ratios.

* Update prices and automatically update yields and P/E ratios and
automatically recalculate individual share and total folio values.

* Record dividend payments and total dealing costs-

* Keep recoitls of youi cash as you buy and sell.

* List your folio, f^t transactions, dividends ard cash accounts.

PRICE ANALYSIS

* Record share prices, unit trusts, indexes, exchange imtes etc.

* Store up to prices per share (e.g^ weekly prices for 5 years).

* Plot prices and moving averages on a Logarithmic or linear scale.

* Real prices supplied as a demonstiaEion (inc. FT 30, B. Telecom),

* Use curves a$ a guide to the best buying and selling opportunities-

Cottiprehetisivn forty page mAniml
Complete with detiumstratioii account and prkes

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Amstraii User March 1989

sdge 10mm below that.

To finish the box with some siyfe ( have
ineluded s small sheet of transfer lettering in the
parts list for personal ^bellishments.

There's just the wiring left to do now. All the
connections are shown in Figures II and III. Allow
3 little sleek in each wire so that it can be moved
aside if needed, but not too much sO that it won't
fit in the box.

Both wiring diagrams show the top, uncop¬
pered side of the board. Dotted lines mean that
the wire is underneath, solid lines mean that it Is
on top. To avoid confusing diagrams I hav^
shown some connections by arrows {which I't
necessarily point in the correct direction} and
some letters inside circles, identical letters con¬
nect together - a connects to a, b connects to b,
and so on.

Pin d3 in Figure 11- ROMDIS-has two connec¬
ting points, the edge or computer connector,
soldered to the board, and the through connec¬
tor. They are marked C and T for Computer and
Through. The T connection must be soldered
straight on to the through connector. Don't mix
them up or It won't work,

Many of the wires pass under the edge connec¬
tor and on top of the board; these will be obvious
as you come to them. SW2 can be fitted to the
box at this point, but allow several inches of wire
so that the board can be taken out without
needing to unscrew the switch.

When that's all done, gently press the wire
against the back of the board, fit the assembly
into the box and screw the whole thing together.
Don't put a rom in just yet. With the power off,
plug the unit into the computer's expansion port,

which is marked Floppy Disc cm the 464, set the
switch on the Romchanger to the right (yellow)
and power up. If all is well the computer should
behave as normal, Press the reset button and
your computer should reset.

Now power down, set the switch to the left
{greenj and power up again. The computer
should hang up. We have disabled the internal
rom and replaced it with nothing.

Now you can power dowr>, fit the 464 or 6128
rom, making sure that the half moon indicator is
positioned as shown in Figure II, and test
everything again. This time when the green light
is on you will see a different Basic version
number on the scieen and you have your alterna¬
tive system in operation.

If thirtgs don't work as described, make the
following checks. Are the diodes and LEDs the
right way round? Is the rom the right way round?
Check that all the connections are made and to

FigufiB !V: Haw to
$oider the edge
conaeetor (o the
through connector

the right piaces-

Go over the diagrams with a coloured pen
when each connection is checked to make sure
you've done them all. Are ail the components in
their correct positions as shown in the diagrams?
Check that no sho Its exi St between close joi nts. If
all ffiese check out and it still doesn't work, ask a
friend to check it out for you.

The unit must be the first peripheral to be
attached to the 50-way edge connector - labelled
Floppy Disc on the 464 and Expansion on the
664/6128 -so that the external rom can Intercept
ail ROMDIS operations as described earlier.

Beca use the boa rd is not fixed solidly inside th e
box, use the through connector to push it on to
and pull it from the computer. Avoid squeezing
the wiring when inserting a rom.

The unit has been used successfully on both a

Rgufe Ifi: Psit two of the wiring diagram

Amstrad User March i939

Page 41

HA/IDWAR£

464 with a 6123 rom in it^ and a 6128 with a 464
rom in it, but I should point out that because
6t28s and 664s have their disc roms fitted inter-
natiy, they produce the ROMDIS signal internally.
This means that the external rom cannot
intercept the signal and cannot be disabled for
the disc rom to be initiaiisad. The 464 disc is
external and will wortc perfectly.

The two system roms contain different pro¬
grams, so switching between them while the

computer is switched on will put you into a differ¬
ent program, causing a crash. Either power down
before switching or use the reset button after
switching,

For those who haven't yet phoned, written or
read last month's letters pages, the six ceramic
capacitors on the December issue DIY rom board
- which are in the circuit to absorb any voltage
spikes - should be connected between 5v (pin 28)
and ground (pin 14} of the six rom sockets. They

P^T

PART

OTV OfSCRtPnOk

MlJNBEB

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TOTAL

^ Clr'^ylt board

Tjrpfly

£76-ug

0.7^

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1 DIL £ockat ZB-pin

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1 ECrJi

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0.95

1 fl.e stator 2k2

HaplIn

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1 Ceraii-ic disc capactt&r fjn

HaplIn

D.OT

2 Diodes ihHliS

Naplin

D.D4

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1 Edfffl connector SO-wiy

Naplin

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2 .B. 1 ]

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1 SPST 5Hde s-ttch

Hep 1 in

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h*flp-l in

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PtBPl in

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1 LED

md in

Miim

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1 Sheet gf transTar latiera 2.5np

H 5 .pi in

KH?!

0,46

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HaplIn

BL924

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T Through connecter

H t troSf y 1 e

resow

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BT.O-9

flaylel^h, fiR.

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fcrttcroStvlai £lf Dirflay Hill Road,

• Tflindy -

see local

rellow Pegta

Bradford, B02 3DF.

under Electrical

Supplier

(Tel aZ74 6 J 6 SSf)

fietatifcra".

ACU Fomchargef -
parts, suppliers
and prices

can be connected any way round, one capacitor
to each socket.

Many thanks to everyone who has phoned or
written to say, "The romboard works!" We know
ft works, but it helps us to know that you've suc¬
cessfully completed the project.

Good luck with the ACU Rom changer. What
shall we build next? Hmmm?

9 Since the pins are only a tenth of an inch
apart you will need a small soldering iron.
Any Tandy store will have one irv stock for a
few pounds, along with solder.

9 To make perfectly soldered |olr>ts, the end
of the wire should be tinned (coated with
solder). To do this, strip about 1.5mm of
insulator from the end of the wire with a
sharp knife, hold the stripped end on the tip of
the soldering iron, place the solder on to it
and allow it to run over the wire,

9 To connect it to a pin, charge the tip of the
iron with a small amount of solder, place the
iron against the pin and then place the tinned
wire against the pin. The solder will run
together and a perfect ioint will result.

idyawfaae

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Page 42

Amstrad User March 1939

PROGRAMMING

When it
comes
to the
crunch

Auntie John has designs
on data compression

JJ'

F DR some redson the display of a conii'
puter, or more accurateiy the screen
memory, always gets more attention from
machine code programmers then any
other area. Far be it for me to fly in the face of
public opinion. This month we are going to look
at a routine that will compress screens.

What this mearts is that the IBk normally
needed for storing the pixels is going to be
reduced, on average, to about dk, allowing screen
desigrts to take up less space on disc and tape,
atrd so speeding loading end saving.

The arnount of memory saved depends a great
deal on the content of the design. This win
become apparent when I explain the compresS'
ion technique to be used.

Due to the Bermuda Twilight Triangle Zone,
which as you know is centred over the tiny village
of Brentwood in Amstradshire, this issue of ACU
is dated March, although it is barely February as
you are reading and, as I write, Scott and
Charlene aren't even engaged yet
An imaginative explanation for this time dif¬
ference was Once put forward by Lance Davis,
our letters editor, who suggested that by dating
the magazine in this way we could all get a month
off for holidays in July or June. Or was it May?

Anyway, as with everything else you read in
A CO, th is sho u Id be take n not on iy with a pi nch of
salt, but with a dash of pepper, a dollop of brown
sauce and perhaps a little tomato ketchup or Soy
sauce as well. But I digress - I only wanted to
warn you that St, Valentine's Day is coming up
soon. I want lots of cards, preferably from the
female readership.

Back to data compression. The technique we
ate going to use is called run-(ength coding.
Instead of storing each byte of the display, we
store the value of the byte and how often it
occurs. For example, if the first fine of the screen
contairred 10 bytes of value 2B6,40 bytes of value
100 and 30 bytes of value 42 we would store the
bytes as shown in Figure I,

Vou can see that H the screen contains simple
blocks of colour with little variation, the memory

saving will be very large. On the other hand if the
screen is very complicated - a digitised picture
for example - the saving will not be so great.
Other compression techniques are used for

Byte va lue

Number of times it
occurs in the line

4 iifie or^ Hmof hypoth$ttsfiieta

these more complicated pictures, and perhaps
we'll look at some in a later IHe.

Thus we have two programs to write; One to
compress our screen design, another to decom¬
press and redisplay it. Such routines running in
Basic couid take several minutes; in ZBO machine
code, however, the timing is a matter of seconds.

Simpty re^

Isn't it typical. No sooner have I poked fun at
Chris the Hippie for having a Spectrum than he
goes out and buys an Atari 52(1ST. It appears that
all the trendy new computers are that funny off-
white colour. You know, white with a hint of
cooking chocolate. Therefore to obtain maximum
street credibility with your trusty gun-metai CPC,
I recommend removing the outer casing and
spraying it with white car paint. Remember to
wave bye-bye to your warranty as you turn the
screws.

If you want to be even trendier, you can use a
different colour. I predict that bright red micros
a re ju at around th e CO rner. Why n 01 be the first on
the block with a pillar-box CPC?

For the more fashion conscious, stylish stickv-

backed plastic is available in an assortment of
colours. Care should be taken when applying it -
one key looks very like another when coated in a
layer of bright green plastic. And although such
an arrangement will liven up your letters, your
machine code programs will suffer.

The individual style of the programmer is also
considered very important in some circles; Haw¬
aiian beach shorts are out. but dark glasses and
peaked caps are very popular. If the glasses are
very dark, difficulty will be experienced in
reading the screen and will give the same results
as the sticky-backed plasdc.

Anyway, Listing I is an assembly language pro¬
gram suitable for producing run-length data. It
makes several assumptions. The first is that the
screen memory starts at hex address &CQO0,
meaning that the screen has not beerr scrolled.
The second assumption is that the compressed
screen data is to be placed at address &4000
onwards. For this reason, always set HIMEM to
below 8(4000 before catling the routine -
MEMORY St3FPFw'\\\ do the trick.

The length o-f the compression data is.stored at
hex addresses Et8D60 and &8DG1. After the
routine has been called, the length can be
calculated as follows:

2M l(igth'PEEt(£30&SHPE£K(£30if)*2J6

The compression ratio - a measure of how
successful the compressiorr was - can be found
with two lines of Basic. The value fG384 Is how
many bytes a non-com pressed screen takes up:

r at i 051 (}«- (Ltfig t 163S4) *1 ae

?30 PRIST 'Coinpresiion;’;r4tio;T

A ratio of less than 2Q percent means that your
screen display is just too darn complicated and it
is probably not worth your while compressing it.
If the ratio is greater than 20 per cent the data is

Amstrad User March 1989

Page 43

PROGRAMMING

worth saving. The following line will achieve this:

SAVE 'sqjashed''^by£4|30EI,length

Of course, having alt this wonderful data saved
to disc or tape is quite useless without a routine
to reverse the compression. Listing II takes data
starting at hex address 8(^000 and reconstitutes
the picture. If the data is rvot at SiJOOO some very
pretty and very useless screen designs will result.

Compile time

As a very special Easter gift to those of you stiti
without assemblers - and this is not as may be
suggested simply a way of padding out my article
to get more money to pay off my student over¬
draft - I am including Listing III, a Basic hex
loader.

How's the juggling coming along? I hope
you've been practising and can now keep the

balls up in the air for at least 15 minutes. If so,
you are ready to make your first social debut ^
overnight you can become the most popular
person in the neighbourhood.

Pick a good night. If you intend to be outside,
make sure it is not too windy: if you are indoors,
make sure the ceiling is high enough. The best
way to start is to act naturally. Casually reach into
your pocket during a conversation and produce
your three objects. Then, still talking as though
nothing untoward is going to happen, begin your
act.

If all goes well, you can finish your short dis¬
play, place the objects back ir> your pocket and
make your farewells. The look of open-mouthed
awe on the faces of those around you will be
amazing.

Warning: If you should happen to drop an
object or, worse still, throw it somewhere by mis¬
take, on no account attempt to retrieve it. Believe
me, it's safer where it is. Simply place the

remaining objects in your pocket, glance at your
watch and say, "Gosh, look at the time - I'm late
for my therapy".

Ahem. So what use can be made of the
routines we've discussed? Well, if you are writing
your own art package and want to cut the time
the user will spend saving and loading pictures -
compression is one solution. If you are writing a
graphics adventure program and want to store as
many pictures in ram or on disc as possible -
again, compression will be quite useful.

The compression routines will even work on
data other than screen designs - any section of
computer memory can be squeezed in the same
way. It depends on the complexity of the data
how successful the compression will be.

See you next time, and remember, if you teach
the cat to ride a motorbike you must be prepared
for some very scared looking mice around the
house.

org £8000

;Sy|gested Btdrt Qf code*

Id hL,£c000

;Start of screei) netiorj^.

Id de,£4000

;Whire data ii to be stored.

Id a,(hi)

;6et fir-st value.

Icopl

Ld (del,a
lire de

;Store viLue.

Ld b,a

;B - cuj'r^rtt va Lue and ^

Ld c,1

;C = occurrenice (or lengtli).

loop2

inc hL

Ld a,h
or L
cp 0

jp s,eiiit

Ld d,(hL}

for end of screen*

cp b

;l5 value tlie same as last time'?

jp fiia,ciuit

;Jf r^Dt the same t^pe^ 50 to "(lyil'

inc c

Id a,c
cp 1

;otherwise/ leTigth= Lsi^gth+I.

jp ns,Loop2

;If lefigth<=254 then continue.

Id a,0

;C is now

Ld (de),a

;so stor^ Z56 as Length

quit

inc d>

Ld b,a
jp Loopl

Ld h,a
Ld

Id Cde),a

ir>E (Je

Ld a,b
jp Loopi

Id a^c
Id (del,a

Ld bc,S4SI}ll

stf

ccf

sbc hL,b[

Ld sA

Ld («806e),«
Ld a,h

Ld (£8961^3
ret

;and continue as tkough
;a neh value has been found.
;MB fl = 256 sod 255

;ftenienber new value.

;5tore Length.

;Recatl neu value and
;go back to finding length.

;StQre very last length.

;Nou calculate total Length
;of data by subtratting S4000
;1ra(i Last Storage address,
;and store in address £3060
;and

Return to Basic.

Listing 1: Ths covTtpressJprt npulirra

org £3045

;Suggested starr of code.

Id tiL,&4000

;Start of daU.

Id de,£c000

;Stsrt of screen memory.

Loop3

Ld a,(hU

;Set value

inc hi

;and

Ld c,a

;pLa:e in £*

Ld a,thL}

;Cei nuiibar of tiies U occurs

inc hi

; and

Id b,a

jput it in B*

LcopA

Id 3,C

Id (de),a
inc de

;P 0 ke to screen.

Id a,d

;Check to see if the end

or e

;of the screen has been

cp 0

;reached*

ret i

;lfes it has^ return to S^sic-

djnz loDp4

;No it hasn't, continye.

jp [oop3

;ThaE‘s the end of that
;'i!alue, Let's tr^ another.

end

19 ' Screen compress,

20 ' Basic loader and demo.

30 '

40 KENCRt S3fFr
50 FOR a=£3000 TO
60 REAB a$:b~VAL(TraS)

70 B0K£ d,b
00 NEKT

n nooE 1

100 FOR t=1 TO 50
110 x^lNT(RND*600}

120 y=lNT(RNDr36B1
130 i’lNKRhb*4)

U0 OklBlN 0,0,x,}|4-i;0,,y,y+40;ELG i

150 NEXT

160 CALL S3000

170 CLS:PRINT 'Screen compressed."

ia@ PRlNTiPRINT "Press Spacebar."

190 yHlLE INkET(47hyEND
200 EALL £3045

210 lngth=PEEK(£g060)tPEtKtfi806n»256
220 ratio=100-(Le>igth/163Bi)r100
230 PRINT ‘Compressionj'fratio;T
240 JATA 21,00,c0,n,0fl,4fl,7e,12,13
250 lATA 47,0e,01,23,7c,b5,fe,00,ce
260 BATA 30,30,7e,b8,c2,28,fl0,0e,79
270 BATA fe,01,c2,0c,a«,3e,00,12,13
230 BATA 47,03,07,80,47,79,12,13,73
290 BATA c3,07,80,79,t2,eb,01,00,40
300 BATA 37,3f,ed,42,7d,32,60,e0,7t
310 BATA 32,61,80,09,20,20,21,00,40
520 BATA 11,00,c0,7e,25,4f,7e,23,47
330 BATA 79,12,13,7a,b3,fe,00,tS,10
340 BATA f6,c3,4b,80

Listing ti; Decompressing a screen

Listing III: For poor people

Page 44

Amstrad User M^rch J 989

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Page 46

Amstrad User March ^983

PR06RAMJI/IIN6

There

and

back

again

S o you want to know how to load and nin a
Basic program from machine code, do
you? Easy. All you have to do is load the
Basic program to address &17D, enable
the Basic rom, jump to the correct address in the
rom and that shoutd be that. Shouldr^'t it?

The jump address on the 464 is &E9BD. On the
664 it's &EA7D and on the 6128 yoo jump to
&EA7S. I found these execution addresses in
Glentop's Annstrad Advanced Users Guide.

Ok. Type 3 short line of Basic, lOPRiNT"helio"r
and then type in as a (direct commend CALL
where xxxx is the [ump address for your
machine. Crashes, doesn't it. Silly us. We forgot
TO enable the Basic Rom.

As I have Vlaxam 1,5 plugged into the back of
my CPC, I made use of an Amor bug - a call to
any address above &COOO from within Maxam
will always jump to a rom, wb'ch means you
can't list or disassemble screen memory using
Maxam. At least I used to think of this as a bug,
but we can turn it into a feature.

If you have Maxam 1.5, retype the example
Sasic line and then type i JjSiEA7B. This time it
vrorks. Problem solved? Not quite. The brief was
to load and run a Basic program from machine
code, so I saved the line 10 PRINT "hello" as a
program called XXX and wrote the machine code
program in Listing I.

First steps

After assembling the code, reset the machine
with Cirl-Shift-Esc - the code at &BE80 will sur¬
vive this reset - then type CALL &BE30. This
works, but it is only a little program. The next
thing is to try it out with a longer Basic one.

I renamed a 26k Basic program to XXX and
tried the program again. It stopped with the error
Line does nor exist I tried LIST and there was
nothing there. Ah well, I must have missed
something somewhere. Listing I works with

Alex Aird gets you kilted up for the marathon
task of doing what they say is impossible

many small Basic prcrgrams, but above a certain
siie Arnold jus: won't play ball.

Then it struck mg. We need to tell the computer
how long the program is. But how? Out with the
Advanced Users Guide again, and there they
were - the memory locations to poke with the
address of the end of the Basic program.

A listing of memory with the Maxam command
I L!,'S[AE66 revealed that on the 6120 the end of
the Basic program is stored four times in success¬
ion from address ScAEBS to &AE6D. The addition
of the following few lines to the assembler listing

after call &be?3 will make everything work ^
properly:

id ;Length of program

Id {Sae66),hl
Id {Sae68J,ht .

Id (Sae6a),ht
Ld

The trouble with Listing I is that it will only
work on a 6128 with a program called XXX that is

Amstrad User March 1969

Page 47

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Page 48

Amstrad User March 1989

PROGRAMMING

Z6k long. What we need Is a program that wilt
automatically detect the machine It is running on,
work out the length pf the Basic program and
poke the relevant addresses before jumping to
the correct address in the Basic Rom. Tell you
what, we'll write it as an RSX so we can test it
from Basic with:

a$-"fi lensns'':

- where "filename" is the name of the Basic pro¬
gram you want to run,

There are several ways to detect which version
of Basic is present. The proper way is to call the
firmware routine KL PROBE ROM - look it up in
Soft 968. One potential problem with using this
firmware call is that the Dk'tronics bank¬
switching command, i EMULATE, fools any
routine calling Ki PROBE ROM into thinking that
a 6128 Basic rom t$ fitted, even if it isn't. So I
prefer to peek the bvteal&C002 in the upper rom

- 0-CPC464, 1=CPC664 and 2 = CPC6128.
Besides, as the Basic rom is going to be enabled
anyway, a peek is the simplest way.

It is very easy to find the length of a file. After
the call to CAS IN OPEN, and assuming the file is
opened correctly, the register pair BC will contain
the length of the opened file. Now the program's

requirements are known, the program itself can
be written. Type in and save the code generated
by Listing II with;

SAVE ''b^rrun,bin",b/liB'0B^i71

At first this program had a habit of crashing on
my 6128 and I had difficulty in finding out why. I
eventually discovered that it was because of
either Protext or Promerge Plus. One or both - I
didn't want to unplug either to find out - changes
the start address of Basic,

This is OK when you are simply word process¬
ing, but I was assembling the code using Protext
and Maxam 1.5, then jumping to the routine from
within Protext,

Everything works if you save the code as a
binary file then reload it after resetting the com¬
puter with something like:

tfl ilfltaOL AFTER IH
20 HENORT ifiFFf
T0 LOAb"bjrrun,bin",£Al!0l3
40 CALL £Ae0l9:NEU

You could add another couple of lines to List¬
ing II to cure the problem of the clash with
Arnor's roms. Simply poke the start of Basic at

the same time as poking the end of Basic;

Id ht,i16f
td aae64^h'L

The address to poke is &AEB1 on a 464 and
8IAE64 on a 664 or 6128. The normaf start
address of Basic is 8i170 - the vafue to poke is
one Eess, 8(16F, The ciash is tn no way Arnor's
fault because poking the Basic variables area is
not realiv legit.

Poking the start address is quite interesting
really. Why start programs at &170? Why not
start at a different address? it is possible to load
and run programs at any address from & 170 to
HIM EM. It is also possible to have several pro¬
grams in memory at the same time, poking the
start and end addresses before running any of
them.

For 6128 owners - and 464/664 owners with
memory expansions - there is the possibility of
loading and running programs from the extra
memory. A bit of bank switching in conjunction
with the running of a Basic program at 8t4000
could be an interesting programming exercise.
The only thing is, wouldn't you end up with a
silicon disc operating system? And hasn't that
been done before?

L($ting I

tinit iffff

;Max3i assembl-ef directive.

Org Sbe30

jp start

buffer equ Ei;0B0

naae defm

start Ld b,3

;Ungth of fitename*

;Tape users can this

load the next program

from tape

Ld tiL,name

;flddres& of filenaa^.

Id de,buffer

;flddres5 of a 2k butfer.

tall ibc77

Ld hL,E170

^Address to load file.

call 6bc&3

;Load the file*

call Ebc7a

Id c,B

^ROu nuntber ie^o.

call 6b90f

;TtJrn it

jp £ea78

;Run Basic program 61?3*

LisJing II

org &al}0B

cas,^in^0.pen equ ^b<;77
eas_in_etase equ kbc7a
c#s_ini_di rsEt equ

Ld hc,njHtal>

Id ht^uspace
catl fibcdf
ret

uspace dels 4
namtsb def w naites

IP runbas
defb Q

naises defni'"im'

db •'r*m
defb B
runbas cp 1
ret nz

.Id l,(ix+0)

Id h,(i*+n

Id a,(bL)
td

inc hi
Id e,(tsi)
inc hi
Ld d,(lvl)
ex hl,de
Ld de^£cB0B
calL casJn_qpen
pvah be
Id ht^8l7B
taU cas.in.iiir^ct
calL cas_in_{Lcse
pop hi
td t!c,aT7B
add hL^bc
td c,0
tall tb?0f
Ld a,(&ce02)
ep III

jp i,fpc464
Ld Cfiaed6)^hL
Id C&ae^8),liL
Id C&aeda),hi
Id riae6c),hL
cp 1

jp i,cptd64
jp EeaTS

;Check for one parameter.

;Get addresa of (iLenama.

;Put it into HL.

;&et Length of fiLenaiie.

;Point to address of fiLename.

;HL = address of f i Lenaine.
;Addfess of a 2li buffer.

;Save program Length.

;Address to Load fiLe to,

;Load the file.

;Put program length into HL,
;Start address of Basic progran,
^Calculate end of Basic program.
;ltoit number aero.

;Turn it on.

;&et rom type.

;If it's type zero,

;jupp to 464 routine,

;else
;poke
;Basic

fvariabLes 664/6126.

;If it's rom type one,

;juiiip to 664 routine,

;eLse run Basic progran 61 ?8,

cpc664 IP 6ea7d

;Rurt Basic program 664.

cpi:464 Id (Eaea31,hL
Id {EaeES1,hL
Ld {Eae87),hL
Ld (6ae89),hL
jp ie9bd

;Po)!e

;Besit

jveriables 464.

;Run Basic program 464

end

Amstrad User March 1989

Page 49

RfViEW

I . /

/Vo-fluofer iS128 ontyl costs £57.50 from DGA Soft¬
ware, PO Sox 3S, Ashton-under-Lyne, Lancs, Oi?

m (Tatm^soom.

■ HAVE never seen a poor bookie. I know one
whose Mercedes is due for an MOT end
another who has had to out his vacation to
only a four week cruise on the OEItr but pen-
niless is a term that cannot be applied to the
accountants of the turf. They make their money
by allowing ordinary people like you and me to
make wagers on the outcome of varying ind-
dents, including the sex of the latest royal baby
and all manner of odier things.

But the mainstay of their incomes is the loot
they pocket from the followers of the sport of
kings. Ah yes, the turf accountants of this world
absolutely love the casual punter.

The majority of casual punters apply no system
to their bets. Some back a nag on the basis of its
name. The bookie, however, has a team of folk
applying hard-won racing knowledge to the form
of each horse in a race, making expert predictions
of the outcome. It's on this basisthatthe odds the
punter is quoted are initially arrived at. After that
the number of bets for each horse, and their
amounts, influence the odds either up or down.

That i$ the bookie's advantage and why ha
rarely makes a loss. If the punter had the same
team working for him, the chances of making an
inroad Into his bookie's profit might well
improve.

If you think about it for a nanosecond you
might well come to the conclusion that there
must be a set of rules that can be applied to the
analysis of racing form, if that is the case - and it
is - then why not find a way to speed up the
acquisition of the analysis skills, then speed up
the application of them, put the whole caboosh
into a package that anyone can use, call it Pro-
Punter and charge about C60 for It? Too late, Tm
afraid - it's already bean done.

For better or for worse

Having made my contribution toward the odd
cruise round the Med for the odd bookie in my
time, I was more than happy to take a iook at the
CPC-own I ng punter's latest tool for redressing
the balance. Redressing the balance? It was
going to have to do a lot more than pay for itself
to do that

Rumour has it that all bookies are, shall we say,
perturbed at the thought of some high roller who
invents or discovers the perf^t betting system,
so you'd have thought that Pro-Punter would
have them shaking in their boots.

Not so. At least the chap who continually
makes sure that I don't waste my hard-earned
cash on fripperies like booze and fast cars reck¬
ons it can only do him good because the "mug
punters" will read the reviews, rush out and buy
it, and then start contributing to the never-ending
pit that seems to be his bank balance.

But Pro-Punter is a very cautious tipster; it
tends to advise a no-bet rather more often than

Straight from the
horse^s mouth

2‘30 ASCOTlS

ACU

H'CAP cH.g|

}• HACKED!

four ,

3'/?LE X'5 Pencil 3:

5 FRoCiRAH CPASW;
ADv/ice fo-i kiji

David Dorn hedges his bets on a package
thafs odds on favourite to win by a nose

Fair Frank Fairclough would like.

Pro-Punter, in its rather nice turf-green pack¬
aging, doesn't guarantee dead certs, but it does
hold the promise of helping the cautious investor
reap a rather larger reward than might otherwise
be the case. In effect, the program Is a com¬
puterised form arralyst, giving non-emotional
advice on the basis of information supplied to it.
In other words, it applies a system, makes a fore¬
cast and advises on the prospect of making a
profit from an investment.

Just in case you aren't familiar with punter
terminology, we don't make bets, we invssi in
certain animsls. We don't see which horse has a
name we like, we weigh up the form, And we
never lose money - we make a poor mestment.
Ahem.

The CPC version of Pro-Punter is s develop¬
ment from the earlv-1987 BBC Micro program,
which has shown some quite remarkable stat¬
istics since then. Indeed, it is DGA's proud claim
that from 23 races, advice from Pro-Punter resul¬
ted in 17 winners with a 100 per cent return over
stake. The blurb says that you don't have to be an

expert in the turf to use the program because it
adjusts automatically to suit the race under
analysis.

The best way to put the thing to the test,
thought I, was to proof it to myself over a period
of weeks, first without risking any money and
then, if the dry run proved successful, with a few
smallish investments.

The 1i&-page manual is perfectly adequate for
its purpose. The text is well laid out and quite
readable, though there are some sections that
could do with being couched in slightly less con¬
fusing terminology. That means it might be too
difficult for some people to read and understand
-including me,

Reading through it the first time may take a
little doing, but further dips as the program is
used makes everything much clearer. Be advised
though, you will need to dip into the manual
often,

The next step is to gather around you the
necessary bits and bobs to make the thing usable
- some blank formatted discs, a copy of the
Sporting Life or Racing Post - which all

Amstr^d User March 7989

households take daily anyway, don't they? ^ and I
a supply O'f cash to invest.

Please, take note ot the paragraph in the
manual that tells you to use only money that you
can afford to lose. Investing in horse racing is at
best a risky business and at worst the road to the
debtor's prison, if you aren't already hooked,
don't start now. Sermon over.

The blank discs are to make your working disc
“ yes, Pro*Punter is unprotected - and to hold
your library files, of which more later.

Making the running

Having made the working copy, the next thing
you're going to want to do is try the thing out. If
you're anything like me, you'll crash it with a
Basic error within two minutes of mnning it.

The opertmg screen offers six choices, consis¬
ting of input stages or^e to six, and the results
menu. Selecting stage one loads the trainers file.
This is where you can maintain a record of the
success or otherwise of your favoured trainers. |

It was here that I bombed out into Basic. Since
it didn't already exist, I selected to update the file
and then just pressed Return to see what the
error checking was like. The result was Syntax
error in 470 rapidly followed by Line does not
exist in 0, neither of which exactly filled me with
confidence.

Oh well, back to the start. Re-boot and remem¬
ber not to make atry silly mistakes that ought to
be error trapped.

This time ail went hunky dory, and I managed
to get on to input stage two, which covers the
recent form of each horse in the race. For anyone
unfamiliar with the way the form information is
presented in the racing press, this and subse¬
quent input stages may well prove to be the
major hurdle.

However, as in ail things, practice makes per¬
fect Til ere is a guide in the manual to the formats
used in the two recommended pubiications. This
could be made dearer, but is OK as a starting
point. All the input stages are basically a matter
of answering the necessary questions “fairly
straightforward, if time-consuming.

After about 45 minutes alt the date was keyed
in and Pro-Punter kicked into analysis mode. A
short time later-about four minutes, actuaily-1
realised that this race wasn't going to make me
any money. Pro-Punter in its wisdom decided
that although it had ider^tified a possible winner.

It was not a good bet. Oops, sorry, not a
worthwhile investment.

The manual had warned of occurrences such
as this and wisely advises the putative bookie-
basher to heed the warning. As it happened, the
nag that came out top of the list romped home a
good two lengths ahead of the field and could
probably have won the race in plaster. But then
again, it could easily have fallen at the first.

I'll not go loo much further with descriptions of
all the menus, instead I'll point out a few of the
features and pitfalls I noticed along the way.

Firstly, the saving of trainer tables as library
files is likely to be a godsend to the regular
punter. I've found that following a specific stable,
or a small number of stables, tends to give die

highest return for investments made, so having
that Information on tap is not only time-saving,
but gives a guide to the form for those times
when you might not wish to have Pro-Punter's
advice. After all, everybody likes to do It off their
own bat every so often.

One thing which is missing - left out at the last
minute, according to the manual - is a results
database, something which might alleviate much
of the tedious data entry process and speed up
analysing a particular field considerably.

It seems that there were reliability problems,
which I assume is a euphemism for "it didn't
work". This is a shame, but into each life a little
rain must fall. Why it has to fall on the course that
I've told Pro-Punter has good going is beyond
me,

There may be the possibility of creating library
files on individual horses in a subsequent version
-the version tested was 1.2- which would have a
similar effect to the above.

The verdict

The be all and end all of a program such as this is
will It make you richer? Well, there has never
been a system that would beat all the bookies all
of the time. But, to coin a phrase, Pro-Punter will
beat some of the bookies all of the time, and all of
the bookies some of the time.

If you heed the program's advice and only bet
when it teils you to, you won't lose much money.
If on die other hand you become impatient with
its no-bet forecasts and start backing'the top
rated horse in every race you analyse, your hit
rate will almost certainty drop.

Either way, Pro-Punter is not a replacement for
commonsense when it comes to parting with,
money. As I said earlier, t wouldn't risk the rent
on its advice, no matter how well it had done over
a period. By all means rake a small wad together
and play the field with that but don't get the idea
that this program is going to make you
unbelievably wealthy. There are very few profes¬
sional gamblers, and none that I know of uses a
computer to advise them.

This isn't meant as a criticism of Pro-Punter in
any way whatsoever, but as a general warning
about all forms of computer assisted gambling.
In this case the program lives up to its advertising
copy, so I can't knock it, but in many ways it takes
the fun out having a flutter. It will probably pay
for itself over a season, and it may well help you
make a few bob, which is about as good a recom¬
mendation as anybody could possibly give.

No doubt the sceptics among you will be won¬
dering how much money Pro-Punter helped me
rake in. I'm not going to tell you. Let's |ust say
that my local bookie's son has a 6123, reads ACU,
and not all of my investments were made in my
own name. Why? Because I don't want to be
banned from the betting shop, that's why.

And, Mr Editor sir, that doesn't mean I don't
expect to be paid. (You'll get your money, Mr
Dorn, once you've coughed up my share of the
winnings. Ed}.

S- io

PA V our

racing

t-TD,

,Rac/.\g

ltd.

Arnslrdd User March 1989

Pgge 51

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ArvUilOinaTM _£10.BG £14.BG
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Amstfscl User March J3S9

REVIEW

CoRiptr

Y our Fun Sun has leapt into the com¬
puter age with a bound into technoiogY
so brave Einstein would have cubed me if
he were here today. The two most promi¬
nent features of your siuling Sun are now to be
found right beneath your fingers on the desk in
front of you. Samantha who? No, it's the Sun
Crossword Puzzles.

Where else oouid you find mistress, resent,
aroused, gallop and sweat with only a thin line
drawn between them. Are you a wordsmith of the
highest order? To find out, read on.

Britain's brightest daily has linked up with
Akom Ltd to bring ^us The Sun Computer
Crossword Puzzles Volumes One to Four. At first
glance each volume Is a computerised book of 60
slightly cryptic Sun Crosswords.

A quick delve into the instructions was needed
here. In true tabloid tradition I started at page
three. There at the top of the page, in boldest
type, "MISTRESS," No smutty picture though.
No inuendo. Just an In-depth analysis of puzzle
number one showing us how the answers are
come by.

A cunning ploy by author David Akenhead has
put the loading instructions in the middle of the
booklet, after you have waded through the
analysis and before you get to the sectior^s on
instructions, abbreviations and convention
indicators.

Loading is a simple matter - it would have to
be wouldn't it? - of run '"sun" for all the CPCs,
tape and disc, and when loaded e choice of
crossword number. Crossword loaded, you are
presented with an empty grid and the prompt for
which clue. So far nothing spectacular, In fact a
10 minute walk to W.H.SmIth artd I could pick up
a book of Su n Crosswo rds for a co u p le of q u i d, so

Are You Getting
It Every Day?

Keith Pomfret reveals tasteless
tabloid in computer coup

this computerised one will have to be something
very special to justify the best part of 10 times
that.

If it were just puzzles, clues and solutions 1
would write it off as a very expensive gift novelty.
As a person who avidly checks the following day
in the newspaper to see the solution and often
wonders what the bridge between clue and sol¬
ution is, these programs are an enlightenment.

There are five levels of difficulty within the
puzzles. The entry level takes you straight into a
cryptic crossword. As the manual suggests, this
should provide "hours of competitive stimulus
for the seasoned cryptic crossword solvers".

That's all very well, but there are always a

couple of tricky ones and if they are vital to the
Gompietion of the puzzle it can be frustrating,
Enter level two with the choice of marking the
clue. If you attempt the solution from here, the
correct letters can be made to appear in upper
case while those guessed wrongly remain in
lower case

If it's the morning after the night before and a
kick in the Synapses is needed then it's on to level
three where the type of clue is revealed. You
need the last page of the manual to translate the

ACft055

t Mahe cuts iji
writer

* ? motor

j4.4j PrejuUite

sun Of

b* blossom

irony fS) *

f I Aijother

pan u> ,j,p yp ^3^

SS»' 7 S '«

TftJI close friond <$)

cryptic clues

M Atuck Billy f4i

fXi?"’;.,.?'"'''

down

for

^ w old

Niek f7j

irejand upstt

* The first

* which

Hitman noth-

on .. . f 7 j

^ frpni now on

a char
gelling j,

Ifl Just published no.

® wreeX h
fl boas fSj

"'hjcle rn HatJa.

vestero,

ACROsSj 1 w

* Beef, a Digs

Board fhoredj. 13 Sti-

iilt 15 Rupe-E-4, 17

|2 S."o,!f-u*2J pS

f* M»ybe he* rich in
treasure

1« Storm V,. Ip ^ 3 E < of

riatatJi for

AmstfSd User M^rch W89

Page 53

RfVlEW

/... /

abbreviations back to their meanings, This iook
into the compiler's mind is a heipful ciue as to the
way these things are created and as such are
more than a mere clue.

Sinking to the depths of "Does paraffin really
do that to your brain if you drink it," level four,
aptly called Coffee Time for its instant artswers
and clues so simple an Amstrad Action reader
could do them.

Just by accident I found level five described as
for beginners. This one gives you a coffee time
clue with its first Jetter included. On the Stamford
Bluet scale of intelligence, this is about as low as
3 goldfish's armpit when ft's lying in the gravel.

To get from the high levels to the low i$ done a
level at a time and I found that if I stopped for a
minute and thought about It, I could with a bit of
effort solve a higher level than usual, If I couldn't
and had to progress to a lower level, each taught
me a little more about the way the clue had been
built in the mind of the compiler.

There is no set order in which you have to do
the pu^iles, with puzzle and clue numbers being
prompted for. With four volumes of 60 puzzles
available there are enough to keep even an addict
going for some time.

The difficulty with programs like these is that
the puzzles will always remain the same. If you
started at puzzle one as a beginner and became
more proflclertt you would have to keep going on

for a challenge. There Is no way to alter the clues
or their solutions in the earlier puzzles - they can
only be used once.

Once all the puzzles have been completed they
wo n't offer m uch cha I (enge unless left a lone f or a
long time. This is true of crossword books, but
they are cheap enough to be considered con¬
sumable.

The analysis of puzzle number orte in each
volume Is a useful tutor, with each clue laid out
and explained. For Example
1 Across: Woman boss causes tension on
motorway 18)

Solution:- MISTRESS

Indicator Du {word division, parts of more than
one word combined.)

Explanation is an abbreviation for a
"motorway'' and STRESS Is "tension"; on means
attached to. MISTRESS is a "woman boss,"

5 Across: Must vary dirty stories |4]

Solution:-SMUT
Indicator An (Anagram)

Explanation Anagram of "must" with "vary"
the anagram Indicator.

Two examples taken at random from the vol¬
umes and indicative of the sort of tutorial avail¬
able. With over 90 convention indicators and
three pages of abbreviations there's a lot to take
In, but it's ail laid out In a clear and concise
mannet,

An introduction to Cryptic Crosswords from
Edmund Akenhead, former editor of Times
crosswords, gently leads you a little way into the
black art of compilation, but, before you are
frightened away, describes the analysis thus:
"An ounce of practical demonstration being
worth a pound of theory, I set out the explan¬
ations of every clue in the first puzzle of this
collection".

As a simple collection of crossword puzzles,
the best part of E20 Is too much even for an
enthusiast. The Sun Crossword puzzles gain their
real value from the help levels and tutorial and
from being professionally published and docu¬
mented.

To steal the description of the Giant's Cause¬
way: ''Worth seeing but not worth going to see."
I would be grateful to receive them as a gift and
that is where I think most will be sold, as gifts. I
would be loath to part with my own money for
them.

To give the author the final word; "The game
becomes a contest between you and the com¬
puter as to who can resolve the greatest number
of clues at the highest possible level. In the
shortest possible time, points being awarded
according to level".

The

truth

about

TELEX

MOW touch aooi « *****

to go on ToloxT ™

MicroLink. With ^^roup, send o and much more,

create your own directly into - ■ ■

1 the

™u*rjus. - n”" -V '

Amstrsd User M^rch 1939

Pgge 54

Send your 10’Liners to: Amstrad Computer
Us«ir, 169 King a Roed, Brentwood, CM144EF,

Remember to encfose a suitably stamped,
self‘addressed envelope if you want us to
return your tape or disc.

to £10

CATCH by David Hali

THIS has got to be the most impressive 10-
liner ever published, it's a mini arcade game
written aimost entirety in machine code feat¬
uring large, smooth-scrolling multicoloured
sprites with a bit of sound thrown in for good
measure.

The idea is to put on your Isaac Newton hat
and catch as many falling apples as you can.
You get ID points for each apple caught ^iss
one and it's game over.

Take care with typing it in; we Stwngty
advise using Proofreader with this listing
because the machine code belovy is not
checksummed. And do remember to SAVE
before you RUN.

Control is via the joystick. David, whose
high score is 1,670 points, has been a bit
sneaky here, To make the game more diffi¬
cult, left is right artd right is left. No cheating
now!

The Fgures
colurrin of the

checttsu mined by ACU
PrQdrN(l»r, the rail-time
tvpenn tester published in Itie
January 1989 issue of Amstrad' Computer User.
You donl nead ACU Proofreader to be able to rurt
this listingr but having it maites spotting typfrrg
errors very easy.

[24] 1{l FOR TO 2l};49:REAIii aS:

POKE t,VALtT+aS]:NE*r:FOR t=10
090 TO 16289:REAO alrPOKE t,VAL(
r+ai):NE)i.TrlNit 0,0:&ORbER 0;PA
PER fl:s(=CKRt(238)*SPA:Ei(t£]+CR

[ 37 ] 20 HOBE 0 :(LS:PiN 12 :F 0 R t =1 TO
10 :LOtA 7 E ),t* 2 ;PftlNT ai;:RE)tT:P
EN 9 :FOR t =1 TO 10 :H)CATE 1 ,t* 2 +
liPRIHT a*;iFfEXT:LOCATE t„ 22 :F 0 R
t =1 TO 20 :PEH 1 ;PRlNT CHRS{ 238 ]
;:RE 1 (T:PEN 7 :L 0 CAT£ 1 , 24 :PfilhT '
SCORE »';?£« 6 :LOCATE 1 , 2 S:PRIN
T ■’* CATCH * by l>.Kan';:PEN 3
[ 3 B] 30 BATA 30 , 30 , 30 , 30 , 30 , 30 , 30 , 30 ,
25 ,f,f,f,f,f,f, 1 e, 2 S,f,f,f,f/f,f
, 1 e, 23 ,c,c,c,c,c,c, 1 e, 25 ,d,f,f,f
,f, 1 e, 1 a, 25 ,d,f,f,f,f, 1 e, 1 e, 25 ,[f
,f,f,f,f, 1 a,te, 25 ,d,f,f,f,f, 1 e ,1
e, 23 ,lc, 3 c, 3 f, 3 t, 3 c, 3 c, 1 e, 23 ,f,f
,f,f,f,f, 1 e, 23 ,f,f,f,f,f,f, 1 e ,34
, 3 t, 3 t, 3 c, 3 c, 3 c, 3 c, 3 c, 0 , 0 , 0/0
[Eb] 40 DATA 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 ,
0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 ,
0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 ,
0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 ,
0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 010 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 ,
0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 ,
0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 33 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 11 , 22 , 0,0
, 0 , 0 , 0 ,U, 36 , 44 , 98 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 44 ,( 1 ;
[ 77 ] 50 DATA (t,cc,Ct,&e, 0 , 0 ,tC, 30,(0
,cc,ce,( 0 , 0 , 0 , 98 , 30 ,$ 4 ,ce,co,o(,
0 , 44 ,? 8 , 30 , 64 ,c(,cc,oc, 98 , 44 , 98 ,
30 , 64 ,cc,(o,co, 89 ,(c,«, 30 ,(c,((
,((,CC,C(,CC,OC,CC,C0,0C,CC,C0,0
o,(t:,ci:,c(,cc,co,c(,oc,cc,co,cc,
((,0(,0C,(0,(0,0(,((,((,((,((,((
,i;c,cc,co,cc, 0 (,cc,tc,oo,oo

[261 60 DATA cc,cc,44,co,cc,oc,co,co,
CO,89, 44, ((,((,(0,0(,((,({,89,0,
CO,O(,CC,CC,CC,CO,0,0,(O,tO,(O,C
(,00,00,0,0,44,00,00,(0,00,86,0,
0,0,44,00,00,89

[CD] 70 DATA 21 ,c 2 ,c 5 , 22 , 30 , 80 , 11 , 20 ,
4 e,cd, 1 , 28 ,af, 32 , 4 , 9 d, 32 , 26 ,a 0 ,c

d, 3 d, 27 ,od,d 3 , 27 ,od, 6 a, 27 , 3 a, 28 ,
a 0 ,fe, 0 ,t 0 ,od, 6 a, 27 , 3 a, 29 ,e 0 ,fe,
0 , 28 , 63 ,( 9 , 21 , 40 , 9 c, 6 , 7 , 36 , 30,23
, 10 ,fb, 21 , 18 ,c,e(i, 75 ,bh, 2 t, 46 , 9 e
, 6 , 7 , 7 a,cd, 5 a,bb, 2 b, 10 ,f 9 ,c 9 , 21 ,
4 f, 9 c, 7 e,fe, 39 , 20 , 5 , 36 , 30,23

[ 7 A] 80 DATA 1 S,f 6 , 34 , 18 ,dd, 3 a, 4 , 8 d,f

e, 0 , 20 , 17 , 3 o, 32 , 4 , 8 d, 32 , 7 , 9 d,ed,
5 f,fe, 5 , 38 ,fa,f 8 , 45 , 30 , 16 , 26 , 00 ,
6 f, 22 , 5 , 83 , 58 , 7 , 8 d,f 8 , 92 , 26 , 38,3
c, 32 , 7 , 9 d, 2 a,S, 8 d,cd, 26 ,bc, 22 , 5 ,
6d,11,f0,0,t9,cd,29,bc,cd,29,bc,
7 e,fe, 0 , 20 , 11 , 1 l, 7 , 0 , 19 , 7 e,fe, 0 ,
20,8,11,d0,4e,2a,5,ad

[U] 90 DATA 18 , 45 ,af, 32 , 4 , 8 tf,!e, 7 ,od
, 5 a,bb,cd, 5 a, 27 , 11 , 90 , 4 f,f 8 ,ea ,3
8 , 1 , 32 , 28 ,a 0 ,c 9 , 38 , 4 b,cd, 1 e,l 9 b ,2
0 , 8 , 3 a, 4 a,cd, 1 e,bb, 20 , 33 ,o 9 , 2 a,a
0 , 8 c, 2 h, 7 e,fe, 0 ,o 0 , 11 ,S, 0 ,l 9 , 6 ,c
, 36 , 0 ,od, 26 ,bc, 10 ,f 9 , 2 a,a 0 , 8 o, 2 b
, 22 ,a 0 , 9 c, 1 f, 20 , 4 e,e, 16 ,e 5 , 6 , 8,1
a,? 7 , 13 , 23 ,F 0 ,fa, 8 l,cd ,26

[AC] 100 DATA bc,d, 20 ,f 0 ,o 9 , 2 a,a 0 , 9 c,
1 f, 8 , 0 , 19 , 7 e,fe, 0 ,o 0 , 2 s,a 0 , 8 o, 6 ,
c, 36 , 0 ,cd, 26 ,bo, 10 ,f 9 , 2 a,a 0 ,&c ,2
3 , 18 ,ca:CALL 10000 :PEH tSiLOCATE
3 , 1 hPRlHT *Ha! Tou Hissed !':F
OR t =1 TO 1 S:S 0 UHD 1 ,t, 3 ,l 5 :S 0 UN
D 2 ,t+ 5 , 3 , 15 :NE)(T:FOR t =1 TO 420
0 :NEXr; 6 OTO 20

HERE'S one specially for Valentine's Day. It
uses sine and cosine routines to draw the
outline of a love heart on the screen, and then
colours it in using a Basic fill, the nested loops
in lines 30 to 70.

When the heart is complete - and it lakes
about eight minutes ~ you can press the
space bar to save the whole thing as a 16k
screen image.

It's then ready to be loaded into a screen
design package, like Art Studio for instance,
where you can paint your valentine's name
on it in Earge letters and dump it out to your
printer.

David says if this listing gets published he'll
spend the winnings on his girlfriend. Ahh,
isn't that sweet.

Never let it be said that there is no romance
in computer programming.

f 71 J 10 h= 126 ;INK 1 , 16 ;

B:BORDER

fi;PAPER 0 : 0 OD£ 1 :P£N l:Cli;F 0 R
t -0 TO 999 :P*iNT C 8 Rtt 22 S);;S£)(r
;DEG:F 08 t =0 TO 155 :PLOT 4204 b*C
OS ft), 26046*51 Nttl ,3 :«E):t
[E 4 ] 20 FOR t: 8 i TD 180 STEP 0 . 4 ;PLOT
3104230 tSlN(t), 2304240 ifOSCt);N
EITrFOR t= 1 S 0 TO 273 STEP 0 . 4 :PL
OT 3 T 0 * 230 *SIH{C), 250424 fl*COStt)
:NEJtT

□f] 30 FOR t :26 TO 190 ;PLOr 2004 b*CO
5 {t), 2604 h* 5 INtthiiE)(T
[ 00 ] 40 FOR siS? TO 538 STEP 2 ;f-.t:f 0
R y =10 TO 378 STEP 2
[ 89 ] S 0 If TESr()i,y )-3 THER f= 3 -f:Bi(I
L£ TESTfi,y)i! 3 :y“y+ 2 : 1 fEND
[DD] 60 IF f =2 THEN PLOT i(,y ,3
[ 7 CJ 70 NEniNEn

130 ] 80 IF JNKETJO" ‘THEN 80 ELSE SPE
ED RRITE ':SAVE'!iratent‘,b, 8 i; 000 ,
84030 ; GOTO 80

Amstrad User Marcti 1389

Page 55

The figi^res in the left hand
column 0 f the listings on this'
page show thsy heve been
Checks ummed by ACU
Proofreader, the real-time
type^in tester published in the
Janyary 1989 issue of Amslrad Comfyuw
You doft't nead ACU Pnocrfreffier to be able
this If-sting^ but hevFng it spotting typing
errofB very easy.

-mi

t0 DEFIffT d-o,r-z:PEN T:PftPEfl 0:
mn 1;30Rt»El} 5:1HK 0,0:INK 1,26
:IN*C 2,T6:INK 3,8:ii=?0
20 iii=220:b=3::i=2B9;y=1i0;GO3t/B 1
00:b-6:x-260:6(]SUB 100:m=200^b=1
:i(=2£0:y=160:G{)SUi 100:b-2:y=U0
:6{)3UB 100

30 ni=22B;b=1:x^26fl:y=360:GOSL}e 1
l90:b=2;y=3i0:GOSUB 1B0:b=5:x=480
:y5U0:SOSUB 100;b=6: «=460:GO£U0

WHEI^ David Mortell saw Escher^s Triangle in
November's CPC Computing he said to
himself; "Hey, that look's easy! HI try a
cube". But it wasn't that easy. It took him
many hours to come up with Strange Cube..

David has given up on the never-ending
staircase idea, but has almost finished an
infinite water mill, Infinite water mill? Get it
down to 10 lines, whatever it is, and it could
win you a tenner.

40 b=4:*=170:y=30:GOSU8 1fl0:b=3:
x=150:y'50:SOSUB 100:n=?40;b=4:x
= 160;y=220:G{)SUB 100:b=3:x=140:y
j240;G(}£Ue 100

30 b'4:jc:360:y=20:G03llB 100:b=3;
x=340:y=40:GO£JB 100:i=2S0;b=4;y
==340:y=220:GOSUB 100:b=3:x:340:y
=240:GOSUB 100

60 ii=220:b=1rx=140:y=40;GOSUB 10
0:y:20:b:2:GOS0B 100:i’200;b=6;x
=160:y=40:GO£tJQ 100:b:6:x=l40;GO

m 100

70 fl=220:b=S:x=360:y=?0;QOStfi 10
0:b=6:x^340:GOSUB 100:b'1:x-140:
y=240:GO&UB 100ry=’220:b=2:GO£UB
100

30 b=3:x:230:y=200:m=60:GOSUB 10
0;b=6:x=260;G03UB 100:b=f;x;320:
y=160:GOSliB 100;b=2;y=140;GOSlt0
100

90 BHILE I1ilK£lfl='*:BEND:EWB
100 i=1+tb=2)r-(b=4)ii-1+(b=6)*tb
=3}:p=fUtb>4)-(h<3n/2;q=(1 + fb<
3)-tb>4))/2:c=-(b=2J-{b=6}-3*tb=
3 OR b=1)*2*(b=4 OR b=5hF0R a=0
TD r STEP ?;K0V£ x+a^i/y^-a+j:DR
m NEXT;RETURN

STRANGE CUBE
by David Mortell

NATIONAL ANTHEM
by Fergus Leen

[??] 10 «0SUB 90

[58] 20 mi a,ad,b,bd,c,Ed:IF a=-1 T
HEN FOR f=0 TO 3000:«£Xr:LOCATE
4,10:PftlNT ST1tINGS{30,,CHRtt247)1
;ENtF ELSE SOltNO 1 ,a,ad:S0UN1> 2,b
,bd;S0UNJ> 4,c,cdl:G0T0 20
im 30 OATA 159,100,253,100,319,100,
159,100,190,100,379,100,142,160,
239,100,478,100,169,150,204,150,
426,150,159,50,284,50,379,50,142
,100,284,180,338,100,127,100,213
,100,319,100,127,100,190,100,379
,100,119,100,190,100,478,100
E2F] 40 lATA 127,150,213,150,426,150,
142,50,259,50,478,50,159,100,253
,100,379,100,142,100,239,100,478
,100,159,100,253,100,426,100,169
,100,284,100,426,100,159,100,253
,100,638,100,159,50,253,50,426,5
0,142,50,213,50,478,50,127,50,21

3,50,506,50

[981 50 tATA 119,50,213,50,568,50,106
,100,213,100,638,100,0,1,0,1,0,1
,106,100,213,100,506,100,0,1,0,1
,0,1,106,100,213,100,426,100,0,1

,0,1,0,1,106,150,213,150,319,150

,119,50,213,50,426,50,127,100,21

3.100.319.100

[(A] 60 DATA 119,100,213,100,426,100,
0,1,0,1,0,1,119,100,213,100,338,
100,0,1,0,1,0,1,119,100,213,100,
284,100,0,1,0,1,0,1,119,150,213,

150.426.150.127.50.213.50.319.50
,142,100,213,100,426,100

[E6] 70 DATA 127,100,213,100,319,100,
119,50,213,50,284,50,127,50,213,

50.319.50.142.50.213.50.338.50.1
59,50,213,50,379,50,127,50,213,5
0,426,50,127,50,213,50,478,50,12

7.50.215.50.506.50.119.50.213.50
,568,50,106,100,213,100,638,100

C8FI 80 DATA 95,50,190,50,478,50,119,

50.190.50.478.50.127.100.213.100
,426,100,142,50,213,50,426,50,14

2.50.213.50.478.50.159.250.253.2
58,638,250,-1,0,0,0,0,0

[001 90 SIhBOL AFTER 32:8lNeaL 247,11
2,112,64,112,64,t20,6,e:HD8E 1:P
RINT ' GOD SAVE THE OUfE

r:L0CA7£ 9,2;PIHNT STRINSS(20,C

NO clever programming techr>igues here. But
a lot of time and patience has been put into
programming this threS’Channel rendition of
God Save The Queen. Gotta be worth a fiver.

Fergus says it sounds best through stereo
speakers. So does Status Quo.

Woops... almost forgot,., stand up before
you run this one.

HRS(208J):L0CATE 4,10:PRIKT STRI
HG$(3O,CKR3{247));F0R f-0 TO 900
;NEXT;LOCATE 4,10:PRINT STR1NG8C
30,CHR$(24811

[6B] 100 LOCATE 18,4;PRINT ' Ccrtverte
d by Fergus Leen CHushrooial'iHET
URN

Page 56

Amstrad User March 7989

FREE

TAPE

At I
can
why

collecting those funny
little vouchers for the last
three months!

In conjunction with Telecomsoft
and US Gold we've put together
a mega tape containing cut down
versions of the latest programs PLUS
a selection of the best software ever to
have appeared in the pages of ACU.

- featured
on the front
cover of November's ACU - in
which you must escape from a
horrendous dungeon complex.
In the full version each level is
totally different from the last,
some in solid 3D, others are
ladders and levels ^ and so
on. Once you've completed
the first level we're sure you'll
want to have a go at the
others, so next month you'll
be able to send for a copy
direct from us, and with
a few quid knocked off!

♦here's the first
me highly
acclaimed

Then from US Gold
playable demo of XY

Then from

there's a
their

brand new game

Kwon,

past.

out a path of savage destruction as you
battle to stamp your supremacy over a number
of opponents. As the game says " He's the
meanest son of a snake you've ever seen, Tough
and mean ... he's the Human Killing Machine."
And just as with Savage, as soon as the
complete game is released we'll be offering it to
you at an extra special discount!

ORDER FORM

Plus there's s selection of great typo-ms
including fast action games, pOMsHul
utilities and much, much more.

And all you have to do to get your hands
on one of these superb tapes ts to cut
out the vouchers printed in the January
and February issues along with the form
at the bottom of this page (sorry, we
can't acc^t photocopies!, filHn in your
name and address, mail the lot to us and
the tape will shortty be winging its way
in your direction.

Or if you would prefer a disc just enclose
£1.99 (to cover the cost of the disc, post
and pachirrgli with the form and tick the
disc bok,

This has to be the offer of the year, but
remember to send in early as it closes on
March 31 1989.

Amstr^d UserMafTch ^339

Please send me the foilowingr (please tick)

□ The FREE ACU tape

□ Software on disc for £1.99

Name_

Address_

PleSsS indicate method of payment j ^*P*^^* |
D ADcess/Mastercharge/E u rocard/Ba rclavcard/ Visa

I I l-U I I I I I I I I I 11 I I I I

Signature__

O made payable to Amatrad Camputar U&er

Graaneast Francis Streetr Londci^ £W1P IDG.

DISCOUNT SOFTWARE

DISC GAMES:

Batman .. 11,95

Bubble Ghost . . . 11,95

By Fair Means or Foul,,.,..,.,.,,,, . 11.95

Cotossus 4 Chess _ 11,95

CotoEsuE Mati-Jong . .11.95

Conflicts .. 14.95

Cybemotd!! . „,H„«1t.95

Praier . 14,95

Empji^ StfilMS Sack . ,11,95

Fire& Forgat .. ,.11.95

FliQlil Aoe . 19,95

Football Director tl. . ,15.95

F15 suite Eagle .. 11.95

Gama Over II . . . 11.95

Gafnei, $et and Maicfi II ... 13.95

Gold, Silveir, Bronze -- 21J95

..14J95
..14.95
.11.95
,12.95
..11.95
„11,95
.15.96
„ 22,95
,11.35

H 4 HI H-! -e 4 HH- 14 1 -H-H-i-H-H

Konanti Arcade ColEeeiion

Lancelot ...

Livfl & Let Die ..

Mickey Mouse.. ___

Operaiion Wolf ..

Paoinania

PirataSi. ..

Prof. Advenkjre Writar ,„e
Rsium oftfto Jedi

Roadblastars ... 11,95

Roirooop . 11.95

Scrabble Deluxe 12,95

Silem Service .. 11,95

Sireet Rghler ... 11,95

Supreme Challenga . . 12.95

Target Renegade . 11.95

Tirrw and Magg( ____ .11.95

Ttlan ... 11,95

T.P, A New Beginning .. 15,95

Total Eidipee . 11.95

Thunderfalaife . Gall

Vindicater . . 11.95

THIS MONTHS SPECIAL

TOTAL ECLIPSE

H.R.P._£14.95

Otira ■ ■-■Hbl'Iblildldl'HliHiil til M £9.95

Offer open until 28/2/99

JLX VFJUUL JLVJLtV e^t

■ DISC SERIOUS:

Spajidsh Tutof ...

..1655

Frarch Mistress _____

,.1655

German Masier ....

..16.95

ftafian Tutor ..,....

..16.95

Maxam ass/diss

..19,95

Protext ....

Proepail ..

,.19.iS

..18.95

Prometga ...

..18.95

Stop Press..

..38.95

ExFa Extra..

..19.95

Rodoe Extra ....

„..8.9S

Qualitas Phj^ ......

..12.9$

TaswOrd6128.„ ..

„16.50

T^pall ..

..12.96

Tasprint ..

,„10,9$

Tasdiary ...

--1fl-95

..10.95

TaseigrT 6128
Matrix Spreadsheet ...

Maetarcalc 128 .

Mssisrflla III
Mini ORice II .......

Amor Filer --

ArnorOffKe Sdle .

. 23 J5

. 29.95

. 25.95

. 2995

.. 15j9S

. ...18Ji5

.............26.95

CPM BASED:

_ 30.95

3095
3995
35 J5

Supericalc2 .

Dr Graph .....

Dr Draw .

DrCBaEic. ..

Dr Pascal MT+ ...... 35.95

Amor C Compiler .. 3895

Maxiim IE ...-. 38.95

Mevadia Fortran .— 39,95

Nevada Cobol .. 39.95

HieoftOevpac 60 . 39.95

Hisoft Pascal 80 . ...39.96

H'isoft C Conpilef . 36.95

lanksy 2 Finger Typing . 16.95

lankey Crash Course . 16.66

MJC SPECIAL

PROTEXT CPM: kxdudbg
Spellchecker 8 Mailrnerge
RRP £59.95 Ouns £39.95

EDUCATIONAL:

Fun School 2-5yeara .. 7.95

Fun School 5-8 yeare . 7.95

Fun School 8-12 yesia . 7.95

WorWWise.. . 11.95

Animei Veg. hfinerai ___ 11.95

Answer Back Jnr Quiz . 11.95

Fict File Speirtg ... 7.96

Fact Fiia Arttimetic . 7.95

Fact Fie Sports .... 7.96

Note: FACJFILES APE EXTRA
QUESTJfGWPACWBFDR THE ANSWER
BACKMiQUiZ

\ CASSETTE BASED:

Maxam 464 ...

...15.95

ProtelKl 464 .

...15.95

Tmmnl 464 ....

...16.96

-Gaitnan Masi&f 464 ..

...14.95

FnBfi(5ti 4M ...

...14.95

Answ^ Back Jnr Qiifez.. ...

. aK

MmiOffffia II464 ....................

...1155

ACCESSORIES:

Priniaf Laad 1U .. ...8.95

PTimarLead 1.5M - 9.95

Printer Lead 20M . ...10.95

RS232 Laads (various) _ ..,.,11.^

Mono Screen Rllsr ... ......12.95

Colour Scroan Filler .. 14,95

Comp Pro SOOO Joystick . .....13,95

Cniser Joystick ..... 9.95

6128 Light Pen ... ...26.95

6128 Mon E« Leads .. 7.95

1000 Fanfefd Labels .. 5.95

3r Oise Head Claanaf . 6.95

Second Diiva Lead .. 7,95

DKT 64K Ueinoiy Exp . .....4495

AMS20LD«eBox . ...995

AHX Mouse + Art.. . . . ........5995

AMX Mouse + Skip Press .. 6995

464 Dust Cover (nion/ieef] . 7,95

£126 Dust Cover ___ 7.95

Ainsted RS232 kilarttte _ 55.95

Quick Sho! Turto Joystick —. 11,95

Multitue 14 ... 42.95

Insidor,,.. ... 12,95

BOOKS MANUALS:

Advanced Amstrad Graphics 7.95

Mastering MacNna Coda .. 6.95

The Armtiad CPb4 Book . 12.95

Pascal Beginners Guida . .......6-50

Programming fie ZSO ... 19 95

RIBBONS

1 2 8

□MPSOOtVZtaO.. 806 7.00 ISjOO

PSiuaonIe 1Q60A1.7.00 16.00

CHnmlSOD...3 l96 7.00 15.00

SUrLCtO.......896 7.00 15.00

SurLClOCabU',..896 11.00

121SCS

Gwwie Airook CF2 Oscsi 5 -r-nrr-iHrl-ii 12.00

AniHillCR2DK9xiO... ...HM

AnudhCFIDiKSxZO...4 £j95

ROM BASED:

Maxam . ,,..29.96

Protext ... ...2695

BCPL . „„,.2295

Utopia.. . ..2295

Prospell... . .........2695

PromsrgsH- 2695

Maxam 15 . 2295

Cage Rom (siau Mace) ... 3195

Rodofi _ 28.95

KDS Rom Board (holds E) .. 25.95

Rembo Rom Board (holds 8) . 31.00

Rombo (boughl with a Rom} ......... 28.95

ALL PRICES INCLUDE VAT, POSTAGE A PACKWG IN IHE U,K,

THE ABOVE SOFTWARE » ONLY FOR THE AW8TRAO CPC RANQE
PCW OWNERS PLEASE WRTTE FOR DISCOUNT PRICES

WJ.C. PACKAGES

QualHas Plus KDS 8 Bit Piorl
Dtsplaiy Font Pack

RRP £44.45
Package Price £34,95

NEW PRODUCTS:

KDS 8 BIT PRUTER PORT:
Givee your printar more BexWliiy -
Ideal for use with QUAUTAS.
MX Prica: £18.95

KDS RS232 INTERFACE: Including
comms soHwara bull ki on Rom.
MX Pries: £45.95

KDS 5.25* OtSC DRIVE: For use as a
second drive, comptete witi soltwaro
8 lead. Plug in and go.

MX Plica: £149.95

CQRNIX SQPTWARE

SIMPLE ACOOUKTS
Easy 10 use small business accounts,
indudina VAT calculalons.
CMaatliE3i65DliC £38.95

CARDMDEX

Easy to use filing system
Caeaatta £1995 Oao £24,95

PRODUCT 009THG
DMc£3995

JOUESTMARNG
Dtac £39.95

FlII spedficatiDni on above
programs avoilsbie on roqussi

PRINTER RANGE

9ttr LCie 144CP8 Front Panef Font
SelACliQn

IIJCMet:t32flL9S

STJUt LCtO As abm, Smn oobiJ'Qi^ri
ILICPflCEe2M.iS

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uJdPrkAtmm

BEST BUY

PAKASCMC1De1:aDl»llJm^
l2tl CPS Frldion 8 Tractor iHd,
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MX Pries : £168 as

Overseas ofdofs welcome - Please wfite lor detaHs

WE ARE NOW IN OUR FOURTH YEAR Of SPECIALISINQ IN AMSTRAD MAIL ORDER, OUR POLXV tS TO PROVIDE THE WDEST RANGE AT DISCOUNT

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Tel: (0462) 328S7/420847 for enquirles/Credit Card orders

Page 58

Amstrad User March 1969

Can you crack
Ian SKarpe's
fiendish puzile?

H ERE'S an interesting variation on the
sliding block puzzle theme that we
guarantee will keep hooked for
hours - if not weeks. The idee is quite
simple^ All you have to do is manoeuvre the
large block on the left - marked B - fully into the
flashing square on the right. At each move you
will be asked for the letter corresponding to the
block to be moved, and then one of the arrow
keys to show which way it is to go.

There is no time or move limit because the
problem is difficult enough as it is. In fact we
haven’t everr solved it ourselves, but we are
assured that it cart be done.

:] 620 PAP£!l#7,lc:rOR i = l TO bp
E] 630 =

ftti ,4)*4+3:tLS#7:P«lHT«7,ChRSn0

Ol 6&B iritotnpliete=0:fOR TO J.FO
R j=2 TO 3

m m IF then TncOffipLtte

=-f

141 670 NEXT i,i

m 6S0 kEHO

08] 690 ■ toapLsted

6F} 700 HO&E 0:LOCATE 5,6:PRINT''Tou

did Til’' 11 j 1'

4A} 710 LOCATE 5,9^PRIN^V8U done!

39] 720 0HILE ItlKtTS<>”:W£Hl>:CALL 5B

Blfl:RUN , .

flp] 730 Draw board position
ill 740 FDR i=T TO 3:i2-2*i*A: FOR ]=

1 TO

'313 750 «IHD0W#7,i2,i2+Tyj6, j4r3:PAP

m7,ati,j):C!-1i#7;PRmi^7,cm(t

0)CHRSC64+a(i,j));

[D3] 760 NEXT j,i „ „ it a

[763 770 OftlSlH 352,U0:PLOT 0,0,15:R

ETORN

[073 730 ■ Ion „ , ..

[86] 790 ORISIN b)(,rby:tRAH 0,hii,bc:PK

bH,bh:&RAH 0,®

lai B00 RETURN

The figures in the lefl
column of the listing
show It has been ctiecK’

Bummed by ACU Proot-
reader, the real-time type-in
tester published in the
January 1983 issue of Amsfraflf CoiTJpofer User.
You don't need ACU Proofreader to be able to run
this listing, but having it makes spotting typing
errors very easy.

[41] 100 ■ Blotkil

[433 110 ' By Ian C. Sharpe

[45] 120 ■

[473 130 ' Initialise

[40] 140 NODE 0:6OIID£R 0

[273 150 FOR i*0 TO IJiREAD j

[6E] 160 IHX i,i:NEXT

[FF] 170 OATA 0/25^15,3/5/22^8

[39] 180 data 4,13,26,9,24/11

[14] 190 INK 15,6,0

[06] 200 speed ink 15,15

[633 210 PEHff7,0

[31] 220 DEFINT a-z

[683 230 DIB Bf6,61,bC4,45,dt4,2)

[F9] 240 FOR i=0 TO 6:FOR j'0 TO 5
[ID] 250 a(i,j)=99:NEn:NEn

[00] 260 fOR i = l T® I*' ^

[273 270 READ j,1}:N£KTiNEKT '

[13] 280 DATA 3,1,6,6,10

[643 290 DATA 2,2,5,9,0

[451 100 DATA 2,2,5,5/0

[5E] 310 data 1/1,4,4,7

[41] 320 TOR i"l TO 4

[633 330 read dH ,1 ,21 iNEKT

IE6] 340 DATA 0,-1,0,1 ,‘1,0/1

[FB] 350 PAPER 10:tLS

[A£] 160 FOR i=40 TO 639 STEP B0

(123 370 0OVE 0,i:DRAyR 640,0,11

[3F] 180 kOVE i,0:DRAHR 0,398:NEXT ^

[8B3 390 illNOOW 1 ,20,24,25tPAPER 0:EK

[773 400 V1NOOV#7/6,17/3,22:PAPER#7,0
: tLS#7

[683 410 hc=12:bn=13Z:by'62;bn=382:bh

slIgiEQSUB 7S0

[533 420 UIND0H#7,5/16,2/21:PAPER*7.,9
^ n S#7

[DSl ;3e bcM2:bx=152:by^94:bw=32B:hli

=260:&OSUe 780

[651 440 bc=0:bx-l56:by=94:bM=326!bh-
253iGOSUS 7B0
[B01 450 GOSUB 730
[803 460 ' Play

[V13 470 incoapLete--1:R81LE incompU

[453 480 DRAN 0,126;DRAIilR 126,0iDRAKR
0,-l26:DRAll 0,0

[8B3 490 WHILE INKEtJo'^iWENDiPRINT E

HR$(ian:lNPtJT'Utier

PERtUtlilF cS<"A' OR tR> J THEN
490 ELSE U=ASt(tD)'64
[6A] 500 PRINT'D!rettion 'CHRSt240}CHR

S(241)DHRlt242ltNRJt2^5>; , „

[U] 510 HfllLE lNKET«<>":REND:d$= m
ILE d$="!dD*INKEY$;UEND
[DEl 520 IF cIS<CHRSC240) OR

43) THEN 510 ELSE dc-ASOldSJ-219

[IF] 530 ok=-1:bp=0:FOR i=1 TO 6.FOR
i=1 TO 4

[E6] 540 IF a(i/j)<>1« _> ,

[eB3 550 b9=>5P^l:b<bp/t> = nb(hp/2M.

hCbp,31=i+dtde,n:b{bp,4)-j*dldt

[C41 560 z=a(b{bp/3),b(bp,4)):lF r<>0
AND zoic THEN cik-0

[2C] 580 IF NOT ok THEN PRINT CHRS(7J

[161 590 PAPER^7/0‘.TOR lO TO bp
F53 600 aChti,n,bCi,2)l=0;NlNDOW47/

b(i/1)*2+i/b(i,11*2+5,b(i/2)*4,b

ti ,2)t4r'3:CLS47

Blockit

PROGRAMMING

Amstrsd User March 7939

Pagers

I •

I '

ravol back Ici ihe

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kni^lilN were boltk

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Format '

Tape

Disc

Price

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•

£19.95

Amiga

•

£19,95

Amstrad PC, IBM PC
and compatibles

•

1 -1

1 £19.95

Amstrad CPC/PCW/
Speclrum Plus 3

•

£19.95

Commodura 64

•

£14,95

Spertnim

•

£14.95

Amstrad CPC

£14,95

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•

£14.95

BBC Master

•

£14.95

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•

£14,95

Macintosh

•

£19,95

MSX B4K

£14,95

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Please send me Lancelot on U cassette D disc

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made payable to Mandarin Software j , , i——

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LETTERS

/ /

Cheap rate cad

SINCE I last wrote to you I have started machine
code, but without an assembler. If there is a book
on firmware calls that is cheap, could you tell
me? Two calls per month is not really very useful,
Is there also a cheap assembler on a utilities disc
or something? 1 doubt it, but you never know.

fl. Bucks,
Pcrtscnosjth.

L[): The definitive book for documentation on
firmware calls is Soft know it's expeirsive
at £20, but it really Is worth Us weight in gold to
ttie CPC machine code programmer- The User
Club stocks it f091-510 8737). Another good one,
although not nearly so detailed, is the Amstrad
Advanced Users Guide, £8.SD from Glentop
(01-441 4130),

Now that we've merged with CPC Computing,
we are able to sell its catalogue of compilation
discs, one of which - Utilities Galore, not to be
confused with our own Utilities Unlimited - has
an assembler ot> it that appeared as a type-in
way bach in the early days r>f Computing tv/fh
the Amstrad It costs £4,95 tape, £7.95 disc. If
you phone our mall order department on 0625
879920, they'll be glad to take your order.

New brafn wanted

I CAN'T seem to find Bionic Commando or Tiger
Road on tape, and I can't get it on mail order
because I never get sent the game. So I decided
to cheer myself up with a joke. Here goes;

Knock, knock, Erm.„ What comes next? Oh
well, I suppose that's what comes of not getting
your letter printed. Let's have a copy of any of the
above. Huh?

Andrew M. Nutbeen,
Romsey, Hants.

LDr Don't know about Nutbee/i, I reckon you're a
raving Nutcase, We've sold out of what you
ordered so you'll have to put up with Operation
Wolf. It's in the post.

Shrinking violet

ALTHOUGH I am nol given to expressing myself
very often, I must write to you to question the fact
that I am unable to purchase separately a colour
monitor for my 464,

P. G. King,
Broxbourne, Herts.

LD: That*$ because the CPC is built and sold as a
complete package, i have heard rumours of
Comet selling CPC monitors separately, but
can't confirm that.

You could try your local TV rental people. They
may have an ex-rental colour television with
RGB input going cheap. In which Case you'll
need your green screen monitor or an MP-2
modulator to power the compirter.

Brother can you spare a line?

I HAVE a 664 and a Brother M-t009 printer. Many
of the facilities offered by this printer, which I
believe is Epson-compatible, require that num¬

bers greater than 127 be sent via the Centronics
port,

Unforturrately the printer port on the CPC will
' not transmit bit 7, Is there any way to overcome
this difficulty which, I should think, must be a
frustration to many users? Is it possible to modify
the circuit board to connect the output from the
relevant chip to the Centronics port?

I have written a machine code program to do a
screen dump, in bit image mode, to the printer.
This program would be improved if bit 7 was
available.

Peter C. Butson,
Harrow, Middlesex.

LD; You cart do one of two things, Peter. Either
I buy the 8 bit printer port from KOS [04853 2076)
or wait for the one we're working on for a
hardware project. Should be ready for the May
or June issue.

Bit near the mark

I HAVE a problem with a disc containing one
binary and two Basic files, I loaded one of the
Basic files to make an alteration, and upon
attempting to resave it a read fail error message
appeared. Since then I have not been able to
access the disc at all.

Investigating further with Pip and Disckit3
informed me that the address mark on track 0,
sector 0 has gone missing. My local dealer says
that the disc directory has been erased arrd that
the fifes are still on the disc but not recoverable.

As these programs represent hours of typing,
is there any way of getting them off the disc?

Send your letters to:

Lance Davis
Letters Editor
Amstrad Computer User
169 Kings Road, Brentwood
Essex CM14 4EF

Have you any ideas on how it happened in the
first place, I thought that CF2 discs were virtually
incorruptible.

Steven Smith,
Queens Park, Austrelie.

LD; Your dealer is correct, there is no easy way
to recover the data on that disc. An experienced
user armed with a good disc sector editor could
maybe salvage most of it, but it would be a pig
of a job.

It's about time somebody released an auto
matic CPC disc doctor to fill the obvious gap in
the market. Disc sector editors are all fine and
dandy, but the only peopfe able to use them
properly are the sort of people who write them.

CF2 discs are as corruptible as any other type
of computer disc. The trick is to keep backups of
everything. Store your discs in a sealed disc box,
well away from heat and smoke and sunlight
and pets and coffee cups and magnetic fields
and..

No messing about

TO get immediately to the point, Lance Davis
{that's me folks} writes that Proofreader in the
September issue did not work with a printer. I
beg to disagree. Referring to the program, see
lines 350 and 360:

3S0 screen^fiBUSA
360 printer-£B&28 '

Now look at lines 380, 410, 420 and 430. Where
ever screen appears then type m printer in place
of it. Admittedly it is not very user friendly, but I
seem to be doing a lot of this sort of thing since I
got to know a friend called Arnold-
At first, when I was greener than I am now
fEeek! An alien!I it seemed a bit user unfriendly,
But I like the magazine now that I am getting used
TO computers. And I like the little tips that allows
old software to run with newer hardware. Like
Starwatcher with the OMP20O0.

I am extremely fascinated by the Hairy Hacker
teo is Mrs Hairy Hacker} and while it is all way
above me, I always read his Haunt.

1/. Goodenough,
Bacup, Lancs.

LD: I swear when I first tested Proofreader it
worked fine with Epson-compatible printers on
a If CPCs. Then one day this chap phoned and
said it didn't work with his 464 and DMPZOOO. So
I checked. And it didn't. But it did before. And
now it does again. Confused? You will he. Next
letter please.

Rubbish tip

THANK you for your courtesy in replying to my
query about opening a dummy file (January, A
load of garbage). However, I was a bit taken back
when you said you did not know "what book I got
fhfs garbage collection staff from'’. I took it for
granted that you would know it came from
chapter 2.6 of the Amstrad ODI-1 manual, under
the heading 2.4.2. Pre-empting a Garbage

Page 61

Amstrad User March J9S9

LETTERS

/ . . /

Collection.

I gue&s thsr if it comes to a shoot-out between
you and whoever wrote the manual, we will hear '
about it. ;

AlberS B. Purbrick, i
London

LD' OKj Bert, let's try again. If c^on't preserve
a 2k butter with OPENQUrdurnrnfmMORY
HIMeM-1;CWSEOUT at the start of a 464 pro-
gram, when it's time to read tti some data from
file Arnold will soream, "'Eeek! 1\lo room I know,
t'H chuck the garbage out", which can cause the
program to hang up - sometimes for as long as
30 seconds or more - while he sorts out what is
garbage and wfiat isn't.

Preserving a buffer means he doesn't have to
worry about the garbage, he can simply read the
data into that area of memory before allocating
it to variables.

Dear Auntie John

FASCINATED, I was, by the firmware calls that
appeared in your December article for insertion
of the extra memory into the ZSO's processor on
my 6128. So much so that I consulted my
firmware manual, Soft 968. Would you believe
they have got it wrong?

Your reference to S 1 BC 6 E, KL SWING TRACK,
appears as CAS START MOTOR and your
reference to &BC71, ffi. SlVfWG BACK, appears as
CAS STOP MOTOR. And, would you believe, that
they actually show SfBD 5 B for Ki BANK SWITCH
gn ffly 6128?

Mind you, in part two they do say that one of
eight organisations of the 128k of ram may be
selected by calling KL SANK SELECT - which
appears nowhere else in Soft 968, as far as I can
see. However, with eight possible ram organis¬
ations, the mechanical switch must be pretty
complicated.

Now about this juggling..,

R. I. Borrows,
Jeddingtpn, Middlesex.

Who, what, where?

I KNOW very little about computers but want to
use what has up until now been my daughter's
6128 games machine as a word processor and
database. Could you please advise me in simple
terms what is the best word processor software
available for the 6128:1 understand that Tasword
and Protest are two of the best.

D. Botcher,
Barnsley, South Yorkshire.

LD;A5 far as CPC word processors are con¬
cerned, it's horses for courses. If you are an
experienced computer user and you Intend to do
a lot of word processing, I recommend Protext.

Tasword from Tasman Software is nice
because it uses the 6l28's extra 64k of ram. But
it is awfully slow sometimes
Over 500,660 users across many computer
formats swear by Database Software's Mini
Office II. ft's big feature is Its ease of use, but at

the end of the day it lacks real power. Good
value though.

On the other hand, BrunWord from Brunnlng
Software is said by many to be as powerful as
Protext and as easy to use as Mini Ottice If.

My advice? If you have money to spend, Waccr
(01-898 109DI sells the Rombo rom board plus
Protext and Prospell on rom for £80. Otherwise
get BrunWord from Brunning Software [0245
252864) for £25 on disc

Two good sports

I READ with interest the letter from Ian Gardner
[January, Bottom of the league). I have written a
suite of programs that do what he is asking for-
except for recording the various players artd their
averages - but I can organise a fixture list for 12
teams playing on various days of the week and
list the fixtures. Also f can record the results and
print or display the league table.

If you could pass my telephone number to Ian,
we could arrange a way of getting copies of my
programs to him.

John Lister,
0U22 8033.

* 4 " *

REGARDING the letter from larr Gardner jBottom
of the league). I have already written similar pro¬
grams for golf and cricket. The problem looks an
interesting one. However I stress that I am not
promising anything.

Having said this there are a few questions that
need to be answered before attempting the
project. Please pass these comments on to Ian.
He can phone if he is interested in taking the
matter further.

Mick EtIIck,
0272 354158.

Blinded by the light

WHAT does the Ed think he is playing at? Over
the last three or four issues the magajine has
changed drastically. Because of the reader
survey, J suppose,

Where is the mega Seek and Ye Shall Find and
the large software chart with the witty comments.
Now I am confronted with trillions of games
reviews. The only decent article that has stood
the test of time is the Hairy Hackers Haunt. Carry
on the good work, Vax.

Pull yourself together ACO or you may be
losing a regular reader. You are in danger of
turning into a crummy second rale magazine
with nothing but games reviews and posters and
the like.

R. Whiting.

Cheddleton, Staffs.

LD: The large software chart was a waste of
space. If you're looking for witty comments, try
the games reviews, they're full of them. Get off
your soapbox and take a good hard look at what
you are complaining about, the games reviews
take up less than 10 pages of a 76 page
magazine.

Hello mum

FIRST let me congratulate you on an excellent
January issue, grovel grovel. (Thanks Shanks}.
Now that's out of the way, let's get down to busi¬
ness. (Gulpl In an early ACU you did a small
feature on the Cheetah 125 Special joystick. (Did
we?).

You said that vario-us games were being coded
that made use of the joystick's extra buttons and
that ACU was going to review such games, (Ah
yes, so we did).

Well I have a Cheetah 125 Special, and I am not
pleased, (Vh oh). The auto-fire doesn't work
(Dodgeeell and where are these games? iGolp.
Erm...).

Anyway I wish the magazine good luck with the
new facelift (gee tanks! and let's hope that the
new Star ACO Game becomes as familiar with
the software houses as other computer magazine
awards. (Can't fail}. Surely that deserves a free
game? (Nah). Oh well, really all I want is for my
letter to be published, (Hokayl. With a proper
reply, (Ah...}

Paul Fresh,
Northwood, Middlesex.

LD; Hey, Paul - great news. Imagine's Victory
Road works with your Cheetah joystick. Yes it
does. Honest- Well, except for the auto-ftre of
course. Read the revfew. No not that way. Back
up a few pages.

What's an Amiga?

FOLLOWING the Christmas spree no doubt many
readers will be the proud owners of new 16 bit
computers, beginning to find out what it costs to
equal the CPC range of software pound for
pound. And, of course, it is always software that
makes a computer worth having.

For example, the new Amatrad PC2086 is a very
attractive upgrade., but on running down the list
of PC software to replace my CPC range -
including Protext, Prospell, Maxann.. Utopia,
BCPL, Mini Office, Advanced Art Studio, Qualitas
and its range of extra fonts - you can estimate
spending at least thrfee limes as much as you
j thought would set you up with the new machine.

My own second computer is The Amiga 500,
but the CPC6128 is still my main work horse, and
with good reason: It has Protext and other Amor
software very nicely installed in roms, so no disc
loading needed.

Admittedly it lacks the amazing fast and stun¬
ning graphics, blitter and Midi, but also there are
no pbgues of SCA and Byte Bandit viruses, or
worms, tapeworms or trojan horses, as some of
them are called on the PC, And no £100 for just
four games. If I wanted to write a sequel to Gone
' with the Wind, I could manage very well with the
CPC,

Experienced CPC users know why they like
their machine. It will still soldier on even when

ffspe 62

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Page

AmsTrad User March ?5S9

The day Roger Jackson sent
his first mailshot.

I was impressed by the fact that Star have now
produced a great looking little budget printerwith a
24 pin head.

I was impressed by its excellent quality -the
3 resident forts available and its high density letter quality
helped me produce a really professional mailshot

1 was impressed by the extremely swift draft elite speed
of 170cps and LQ el ite at 57cps and the standard 7k buffer.

I was impressed by the special push-tractor feature
that allows the LC24-10 the lowest possible tear off and its
ability to 'park' continuous paper and load single sheets
automatically-so there's no need to remove the continuous.

I was impressed by the touch-button front control
panel that makes using the printer an absolute dream.

But most of all, I was paiticulary impressed with myself.

Because my Star LC24-10 was so inexpensive
and no other printer comes close forsheer quality and
value-for-money.

COMPUTER PRINTERS

StarMicroniCSU.K. Ltd,

Craven House,^ Uxbridge Road,
Eal i ng, London W5 2BS,
Telephone: 01-B^ 1800,

A division of

Sta r Micronics Cq. , LtdJapan.

Please tell me how Ihe Star LC24-l0can handle my printing needs.

I Name.

I
I

Company-

Address—

Postcode.

-Telephone.

Ofjuslcall Belinda on 0Tft4O1B2S. J

transputers and many new wonders have
appeared on the scene because its reliabrEity has
been proved.

John Gray,
EMtboiSfnBf Sussex.

Brilliant

I BOUGHT CPC Computing reguJarly. In fact I had
a subscription. When I .heard about the merger I
was disappointed because I have read your rnag
before and thought it rather boring. However
when I received The January edition I was very
pleased. It was a bnifi^nt edition, and I hope you
l^esp it up.

However I wrote this ietter for two reasons. The
first to congratulate you for the improved mag.
Secondly I wrote to complain about your adven-
ture section. I'm a great fan of adventure pro*
grams and was sad to see only two pages. In my
other magazine there was four or five pages of
reviews and tips and solutions and even
addresses to gel together to solve the adventure.
Please fatten up the adventure section and make
a lot of people happy.

Deifid Perry,
Dulwich, Lortdon.

LE): When new CPC adventures ^gear, which is
all too seldom these days, GandaJfs reviews will
be found in the Which Geme? section. We're
working on a new adventure column. But
doesn't publishing solutions defeat the object of
playing adventures?

Dear Auntie John

I AM having a spot of bovver with the TXT
OUTPUT firmware call in part one of your
e)<cellent series, creep creep, the problem being
that I cannot get it to run. Could this be because I
am using Maj(am II and, as such, will have lo'
resort to BDOS calls?

Surely this cannot be, because you state in
paragraph one on page 14 of the July issue: "The
beauty of the system is that it always works - if
Amstrad changes the internal workings of the
computer, as long as the jumpblock stays the
same all the..."

I would very much appreciate an answer to my
problem as I would like to get on with the
lessons,

Chris Ecdes,
Hoyiske, Wirral.

LD: Your problem, Chris, is that IIAsxam 11 is ati
assembler for writing CP?M maehine code tools.
Although the firmware is shU there when CPfM
takes over the machine, getting at it involves a
little mote work then usual. What I'm saying is
that Auntie Johrr's listings will rtot work under
CP/M

You can still use Maxam II to assemble them,
but you'll need to use a Basic program on the
Maxam tidisc which turns a CP/M ,COM hie into
an Amsdos .BIN file. If you can't find the pro¬
gram I mean, speak to Amor about it on 0733
68909.

/■' ./

LETTERS

Free adventure

I HAVE written a text-only adventure running
under CPfM. I wrote it purely for my own pleasure
with no thought of selling it However I would like
to share it. If any interested readers would care to
send me a formatted 3in disc together with a
stamped addressed envelope, I will be pleased to
let them have s copy. Please state which machine
it is for,

K. N. Bor}d,
11 Ade! Park Cardens,
Leeds iSlS$8!^.

Get it off your ch«$t

AT school I went through the phase of not putting
up my hand to ask a question because I thought I
was the only one who didn't know, and I didn't
want to look stupid.

For some time now I have had the same experi¬
ence with computer software, until recent con¬
versations with "would-be" users tells me f am
by no means alone with my problems.

As a shorthand typist, secretary and personal
assistant with years of office experience, I don't
know what the hell you arc all talking abouti

The equipment I own is an Amstrad PC308&'30
and an Amstrad printer. I would love to be able to
switch it all on, write a letter - in all my life I have
never processed words, nor do I ever want to -
and then merely type a norma! letter - without
going through the mental gymnastics-and see it
laid out on paper.

Then I would love to file it, print it - if these
damn computers are so wonderful, why can't
they do both these jobs {operations?) at once to
save time - and get on with typing the next letter
without waiting for the filing and printing to
happen and finish. You know, like you can with a
typewriter.

Corrections and editing apart, I'm not even
sure that typing and a filing cabinet aren't quicker
ar>d cheaper for everyday normal letters.

The biggest annoyance is the computerised
filing cabinets I see on offer - databases I think
you call them. Why do I have to learn a foreign
language to use use office equipment? User
friendly - phooey!

You see, in my filing cabinet I have a ht of
short stories and descriptions of items that I am
told a computer could whizz through and locate
any word or item I wanted. But, and this is a
massive but, as soon as I buy a database I can't
do it.

Why not? I can't understand it, that's why not
A simple example? There are no fields in my
filing cabinet. It has file cards in it with Infor¬
mation on each card, but it certainly has no sheep
or cows in- a field.

There used to be 3 lovely program on the Atari
800 that immediately put a file card on the screen.
You typed on to it, filed it and got on with typing
the next card.

The simplicity is gone. Without training noth-
ing^ is user friendly, and that’s a massive mar¬
keting mistake. The nrachine could and should be

useable by everyone, but right now they are only
useable by people trained in the language of the
systems.

My typewriter, useable by all my family, is hot
- my computer gathers dust. Shamef

Georgina MacWi/ian,
South Benfleet, Essex.

LO: Sniff. S'not my fault. Sniff. And you're
buying the wrong magazine. This one's for the
Amstrad CPC home computer You know, the
one your son keeps pointing to in Dixons saying;
"Me want, mama, me want"

Twoirtto one

I LIKE your rrew Proofreader in the January issue.
However, you say lo save two versions, one for
the screen and one for the printer, One version is
all you need with the following changes:

POtlE KHEMCIIlf

)rfi]NT;?fiINT (P)rintfr or (S)-:

ree

ri : , |j-

mil iSo'P'MH

lNKEVS):uE:>r3

31fi

IF i'-'S THEN ELSE S'

Lli

IF 'KF THEH fRINI 'printe-

S£ PlilN' "scfeen

PR'kl'afE cri, ;,»fiINT;PRlNT Poks

NEHtf,S16 TC tvrfl off.

PRiNKPRIJiT Prtss an^ key’iCULL ta

918:CLS:NEH

With this, pressing P or S gives you either the
printer or the screen with one version, and it also
clears the memory for your programs.

r. R Sperfce,
Lerwick, Shet/and.

On the scrounge

I HAVE never written to you before but felt I had
to when I received my January issue. It was
brought to my attention that ACU and CPC
Computing have joined forces, GRILLIAMT, Just
think of it, my two favourite magazines in one
neat cover. What else could! ask for? (Anyth/ng
yoy war?ii Anything? (T/es, ar?ything.J
OK. The 10 Liners. Where are they? Please
don't tell me they've been stopped because of the
merge. Many others feel this way, you know. So
please, please let's see them again. Then there
will be absolutely no way I can fault you. Can I
have a free game now?

Darrer? Waynes.

London

LD: The ID Liners are back. Darren. They just got
postponed for a couple of months because of
commitnienits to other CPC Compittinff outstan¬
ding articles. Go on, take a quick look now -
there's a real treat in store for you this month.
Run out of free games at the moment. Next
month maybe. Provided you write me an inter¬
esting tetter.

Arus trad User March 1939

Page 65

HACKING

^ • /

Bending the

Vflx finds that if you give a friend an inch
he'll probably take a blowtorch to it

H appy valentines Day folks. III thank
you in advance for all those wonderful
cards i know you'll have sent me. I love
you all, too. \^ile you've been sending
out valentines, my mate Rupert has invented a
new artform; Rulers. You take a perspex ruler
and warm it up. Then you bend it, stretch it with
pliers, poke pencils into it and generally conduct
the Spanish Inquisition on it. No one expects the
Spanish Inquisition ...

Eventually, the njler becomes the plastic incar¬
nation of a very weird nightmare of the type usu¬
ally brought on by eating pizias with chocolate
sauce before going to bed. Rupert's latest
creation involves several rulers of varying sizes.
Go easy with the blowtorches, comrades,

Adam Todd has sent in yet another batch of
sizzling pokettes. First one here is for Killapede,
which I just love. He's hacked the thing so that
one hit will deliver sufficient fungicide to knacker
a mushroom. And you're immune to spiders,
ants and ghostises.

The killapede and fleas can still catch yet
though, so watch it. Oh yes, the Escape key will
take you to the high score table if your score's
high enough:

1 ■

fciLlapedfi

2 ■

■r ■

Atjam Todii

WEffORf

£?000:19ODE 0;8ORDER 0

CALL £B04g;t(}t=0

319

FOS r-

0 TO 15;READ i:

INK p,8:HEXT

DATA 0

24,13,20,1

,26

DATA 3

.,10,18,17,9,7,4

FOR

£9000 TO £903D

READ dS:e“VAL(T+dJ)

PWE b

,c;tot=tot+c:NEKT b

IF totoS16t5 THEN PHlNT'ErOfr

DATA/

:ST0P

100

CALL

S9000

110

load-

! screen.scr',£C000

call

£101:END

130

DATA

21,0:,90,11 ,00,

01,0i,2d,

m \

140

DATA

ed,b0,:9r00,3e,

tJC

130

DATA

06,01,21,00,01,

11,00,^2,

1«0

DATA

77,bt,21,S0,01,

cc,83,bc.

170

DATA

7a,b:,21,36,4a.

22,7d,4a,

100

DATA

32,90,3d,38,Id,

32,94,37,

190

DATA

98,37,32,s0,37,

i3,ia,49

I hope that checksum was supposed to say
8il6C3 Adam, but the code makes sense even if I
couldn't check it personally.

Adam's next hoopy poke gives you more perk
in the disc version of Target Renegade. As an
added bonus there's a poke in it which lets you
leave your Muittface plugged in the back, if you
have one. What you get for your money is 16
lives for player one at>d the clock resetting to 6:00

when time runs out, if you have any lives left.
Type and enjoy:

Tjrget Renegade (dist)

Adait Todd 3 '

PtODE 1:t9t=0:FDF b=SC0 TO 4FF

READ a$:c'VAl("r+4J)

0OK! b,eit9t=ioOt:NtXT b

If tot<>ilA9A THEN PRlNflrror

’ in

DATA.': STOP

INPUT 'Insert target disc and

pres

1 Return',dS

CALL £ED

no need to rendve MuCtiface.

DATA 21,h7,7f,22,ea,1d

DATA 21,56,22,22,e:,1d

100

■ tot=£1662 uithout Lines 80

E 90

105

110

DATA 21,a3,1d,e5,af,67,47,2e

,e3

120

DATA 08,08,11,91,If,ed,b0,e1

,e9

130

DATA 41,54,3c,00,07,71,7b,84

140

DATA 7d,74,a!ci,8c,f0,ec,af,5f

,6f

150

data 57,3t,67,3a,de,00,4f,df

,eB

160

00,2l,t0,00,22,11,01

Adam's last pokette - well, hopefully not his
very last - is for Saboteur en cassette, if you ever
needed loads of time to plant bombs (What do
they grow into? Hand grertades?) and nick the
helicopter, then this is for you:

KDDE

1:F*EPt0Rlf £1388:tot=0

INK 0

,0:IN1C 1,2:1NK 2,16

INK 3

,24:B0RD£k 2

FDR b-

=£100 TO £13D

read

aS:csVALCT<‘atI

POKE

h,c:toi=tot<'c;N£)(T h

IF totoS1E82 THEN PtlNTEi

Tor

i n

data/

‘:STQP

CALL

St01:QORDE)! 0

CALI

S106:END

100

31,3e,ff,cd,6l},bc,21

,00,

110

&ATA

1 1,00,25,e5,d5,06,01

, 0 d,

120

i)c,d0,e6,cd,83,bc,d0

,cd.

130

bt,d0,d1,e1,7e,fe,36

,28,

140

DATA

3t,77,fe,36,c8,te,e1

,2t.

150

DATA

74,22,e0,b5,22,05,46

,af.

160

DATA

9f,tj7,32,c4,47,c3,e7

,5b

Nice ones, Adam. Cheque's in the post.

A brief break there while I stop baby Kate from
eating Bruno ... and we'll press on with this tip
from Mark Bowen in deepest Dorset, pronounced
Darset. He says that pressing the Tab key In
Firebird's Ricochet gets you 300 points and up
into the next level, DoHi't we get the devious ones,
then?

Sometimes we get too devious. Case in point
was the Impact poke of a few issues hack when

line 170 should have looked like:

Thank you Matt Cawley. I blame it on the old
lion noise over the modem meself. Shame BT
Gold don't do Xmodem, innit?

Being basically kind, if a little eccentric. Matt
didn't just send in a letter to rib my, or somebody
else's, nnistakes. No, i can do that very well
myself, Alan Crosby springs to mind. Wonderful
poke, would have made Hack of the Month in
fact. Except that there was no data terminator, no
increment, two incorrect checksums and the
flEAOaS was outside of the WHtLE..,WEND loop.
I don't normally point out people's little faults,
but this was a real wooden Spooner.

First off, we'll deal with your wee pokeykina for
Little Computer People. It's for disc only - anyone
seen it on tape?-and changes the little computer
person's name by deed pole:

1 ■

LCP Nane Cbanger

2 ■

Natt Cautey

J ■
10 1

chk=0;F6R 8d(tr=£AF00 TO 8AF2B

20 (LEAD byCeJ:hyte=VALC£'+byteS)

30 POKE addr,byte:cbk^chii^'byte

40 MEXT adcr

50 1

KESTORE 230:READ chk£

60 :

IF clik<>VALrS'>ch»;I) THEN 140

70 1

call EAF00

80 1

FOR 8'S80AA to E80AAM0

90 1

POKE a,0:NE)(T

100

INPUT 'New nsite: ^nt

: 110

If L£N(nI1>10 THEN PRiNTloo

Long

•:0OTO 100

120

FOR n=1 TO L£N(nS)

130

POKE £80AA+n,ASC(fllIi$(nS,n,i:

140

NEXT n

150

POKE £AF20,885,:CALL EAF00

160

END

170

PRINT’Erarr inn DAITA.';END

180

DATA 21,00,80,16,0e,U

190

DATA 00,0e,42,e5,d5,e5

200

DATA 21,20,af,cd,d4,ht

210

DATA 22,21,ef,79,32,23

220

DATA af,t1,d1,eT,df,21

230

DATA af ,[9,84,00,00,00

240

DATA 48,69,20,43,6c,6l

250

DATA 72,65,00,00,00,00

260

PATA 1195

Also with LCP, if you type LOGON the little
computer person will go to his computer and
give you a chance to change your name. Not
many people know that, Michael.

Still with Matt, we've a pokette which pounces
on Spindizzy. Noit the everyday version, but the
one given away by a certain other CPC magazine
which is also after a piece of the Action, Strange
how Matt should have sent St in to us;

Amstrad User March J989

1 ' AA Mizy pokes

2 ' Ract Cauiey

3 '

T9 RERORr iim

29 addr'fiBFBB

30 (TEAD byteJ:lF byteS=;'CR’THEtJ 70
40 bySe=VAL(T+bytai)

50 POKE ad(fr,byte
60 3ddr=*d(fr+1 ISOTO id

79 LOAD":CALL

80 LDADT.nBABiCALL SBFBE
90

100 ' The key

110 DATA 01^f0,01 JU37/bd
120 DATA 21^2d,i]t,edj,h0,01
130 DATA ee,01,21,40,30,11
140 DATA 40,00,eil,he,2n40
130 DATA 09^#3,21,00^hb,eS
160 data 21,«e,01,eS,21,07
170 DATA be,ei,21,bb,02,e5
180 DATA f1,f3,c9,a1
185 ■

190 ' The pokes
19S '

199 ' Infinite ti^es

200 DATA 32,c2,9b
205 ‘ Fast same
210 DATA 32,b3,ef
215 ' Fast musii

220 DATA 32,8cl,9c,32,9f,9c
225 ' Slow mosu
236 DATA 32,ad,9c
235 ' hlQ nasties
240 DATA 3e,

245 ' 6a(ne
250 DATA 3e,c9
260 ■ *** Leave
270 DATA 3e,cf,32,37,bd,Je
280 DATA 8S,32,38,bd,32,39
290 DATA bd,c3,37,b(J,CR

Well Matt, if you'd like to send me some details
on how you think your disc speedempper works I
might just print it. Meanwhiles Til hang or to
your code. The disc is going back, by the way.

Last poke is from Vincent D'Haeyere in Beigium
and does something awful to Nebulus:

1 ' Winter Gaaes (disc)

2 ' Ratt Layley

3 '

f9 a<lilr=£AF00 TB iAFdb

29 dead byteS;hyte=9AL(TtbytsS)

30 POKE addr,byle:chk=cl!k+byte
40 NEXT addr

50 XESTOAE 240:DEAD chkS

60 IF cDk<>VAL(T+e1skJ5 THEN 80

70 CALL fiAF00:ENb

score table is virgin ground again. Well, almost.
Where have I seen that name before?

Now good news for you wonderful people who
actually send stuff in to me that doesn't start with
"I think Hackers is great ... p/ease send me poke
X. Loye Fred". We're dishing out better prijes.

In order to maintain sn air of suspense, I'm not
allowed to tell you what it is. Let's just say that it's
useful, and that Hack of the Month gets twice
what everybody else gets. Vou want to find out
what it is? Send in yei pokes then!

Ah yes, due to the new prizes I must ask you to
make a statement which has the following gist:
'Thfs is my code/poke/program. I didrt't nick it off
of someone else aed ii hasn't been published
before either. Signed, Conan the Barbarian."
From now on I won't be able to accept anything
widtouc that sort of declaration cm it. Orders from
above.

Right, I've just developed a nasty case of hack¬
ing of the CO ugh-choke-splutter variety associ¬
ated with flu, so we'll have to call it a day.

Luv, the Vax cTan

186

196

200

210

226

236

240

Great going Matt, More encouragement
coming your way forthwith.

Meanwhiles, in the totally frivolous depart¬
ment, Matt's idea of a joke: A fuzzy screen pro¬
gram. Well, it's not too far away from April 1 to be
plotting, I s'pose:

Last in the serious Hire from the Matt Cawley
stables we have a pokey kins here for Winter
Games, it's for the embarrassing moments when
some other beggar gets an eeeenormous score
and you have to look at it every time the game
loads.

Well, no more. With a piff paff pouf your high

Fuizjf

if Halt Cavtey

1
2
3

10 clik-0:FDil 3^dr^£S096 TO 98027
20 READ byt«S:byt«iVAH'S'>&ytfI)

30 POKE addr,byttrcbk=c!iltrbytfl
40 NEXT adcr

50 RESTDSE 999:READ chk$:lF cblioWH
T+Chkt) THEN PRINT’Thfir M an er
arr inn t!ia daita";END

60 CALL
90

100 DATA
110
120

130 DA
140 DA
?50 DATA
t60 DATA
999 DATA

1 ' Nebulas hack

2 ' By Vincent D'Haeyere

3 '

10 RERORT 3276B:R0DE 0
20 LOAD ’rseblDad.bin'

30 DATA 21,ef,85,36,00,i9
40 FOX i=l TD 6;.READ a%

50 POKE 836+{i“i),VAL{T+sS1
60 su9i=SLiirr(VAL{'8'*e$J*i 1 :NIKT
70 IF SUII0 2332 THEN 100
80 POKE S8172,«CD:P0KE £8173,839
90 POKE 88174,£0::ALL 33024
100 PRINT ‘Error in DATA.-iSTOP

Anjsirad User Mercti 7939

Page 67

WORD PROCESSOR
Compose a letter, set the
print-out options using
embedded commands or
menus, use the mail merge
facility to produce personalised
circulars — and more!

DATABASE

Build up a versatile card index,

use the flexible print out
routine, do powerful multi-field
sorting, perform all arithmetic
functions, link with the word
processor — and more!

LABEL PRINTER
Design the layout of a label
with the easy-to-use editor,
select label size and sheet
format, read in database
files, print out in any
quantity ^ and more!

and a

Mini Office 11 offers the most comprehensive, integrated
suite of programs ever written for the Amstrad — making it
the most useful productivity tool yet devised.

A team of leading software authors were brought
together to devote a total of 26 man years of programming
to the development of Mini Office II. What they have
produced is a package that sets new standards in home and
business software.

The sample screenshots above illustrate just a few of the
very wide range of features, many of which are usually
restricted to software costing hundreds of pounds^ Most are
accessed by using cursor keys to move up and down a list of
options and pressing Enter to select.

Is it that easy to use? Several leading reviewers have

already sung its praises on this very point.

Yet possibly the best advertisement for Mini Office II is
that it comes from the same stable that produced the
original Mini Office package back in 1984,

That was so successful it was shortlisted in two major
categories of the British Microcomputing Awards - the
Oscars of the industry—and sold in excess of 100,000 units!

It was up to Mini Office II to take over where Ihe first
Mini Office left off, with 32 extra features, two additional
modules, a program to convert existing Mini Office files to
Mini Office 11 format, and a 60 page, very easy to foUow
manual,

This is the package thousands of Amstrad owners have
been waiting for - and at a price everyone can afford!

1-4 L-; 'jki

SPREADSHEET
Prepare budgets or tables,
total columns or rows with
ease, copy formulae absolutely
or relatively, view in either 40
or 80 column modes, recalculate
automatically and more!

GRAPHICS
Enter data directly g^or load data
from the spreadsheet, produce
pie charts, display bar
» charts side by side or

1 1 stacked, overlay line

and morel

graphs

y COMMS MODULE

r Using a modem

you can access services
such as MIcroLInk and
book rail or theatre tickets,
send electronic mail, telex and
telemessages In a flash — and morel

lAb I

iLi^jin Bcfib 1 ik

matched!

Amstrad CPC 464, 664, 6128

Cassette.£14.96 3" disc

£19.95

Ordw ai any tima of (fw day or night

Far erateW-

Otoo/s tty Pfettei:

AfifTOt w Wwam <a>w

K«r 'M. ih«n ei4aee3B3

72:MAGM>1

Piecufe. mnd me Mini Ofllrp U

*Add £2 itic. Eire CHR^M2tt&£14.95‘' ....... (_ j

Add £5 for Ovtrseai 3" E 19.95 ^.... ..£03 7 I-

Payment: please indicate method ( }

Acces&''Masterco rd''Eiirocard'Barclaycard.''Vi&&

Expiry date
/

Card No. ■ i i j ^ i > -i _I_I i_l_ I—Uj u_j_ \ ...t J

Chequ&.'PO made payable to Database Publicationai Ltd.

DATABASE SOFTWARE

Name_

Address.

.SigTied

Tel;

FREEPOST, Macclesfield, Cheshire SKIO 4YB

Pifdse aHotv lip tv 28 days for d^Hripry

ACU3

READER

"o-to-e.

These two exciting compilations
bring together the very best games listings
which have helped to make Arustrsd CoinputBr
Usert\\B best-selling Amstrad magazine tn the
country. And we've kept the price down to thank you
our readers, for all your encouragement and support.

'*pfatch

Racer

Roland Takas a levels game

A colourful praisod aeries

which developed from the nm V ^
of articles orv writing your own arcade ga
Includes extra screen data.

track. A nifty bit of programming.

I ifp Electric Ed(^Vr Galaxians' Revenge, Trench
and Electric Fencing

space Mania

Space Mania

See onh'erm&rK%r"'l

extrov^ganS.""®'”'^** end plltforms

Spfatch

we rep'lyl'H'^lp'ha 'rabh",™ Balderdash,

don’t forget to droo an^H *° '*’® “"“'e. end
Great

DoSwe°TrMb%”up'‘uo and A*"™®®!!' ‘■=8®’

Cotobat, Plutoberdroid"?;av:r?ef;a'®"i„ e„^

Roiand Takes a
Running Jump

Tape (Each volume comes on two casettes) _ £7.95

Only £2.95 with a new subscription or su£iscnfpr/oo renewat

Disc _ £9.95

Onty £3r95 wkh a new subi^cnptfon or sub&criptlon renew^t

AH games work on Amstrad CFC 464, CPC
664 and CPC 6123 computers unless stated
otherwise. You can Hst arrd adapt ati the
Basic files - an excellent to improve
your programming skills.

EXCLUSIVE

READER

AMGRAPH*

Am graph allows you to enter tables of
figures and pf#s«nt them in a neat,
graphical^ form. In addition to pfg and bar
graphs, this program offers stacked and
3D bar graphs, alt with autoroatic scaling
and an Epson compatible printout facility.
November 19S5.

SORCERY PLUS HACK*

A suite of programs that makes playtng
Sorcery Plus easier and more fun. You can
easily adapt the sprites to your own
design^ and increase your survival
chancflS- t9&G.

HOMESPREAO

A simple but fte>tfble spreadsheet program
you can use without having to learn all the
complicated commands of a big
spreadsheet yet still perform sorr^e
startling and sophisticated operations.

DIARY

A disc-only program that demonstrates
how to simulate random access files
under Amsdos withoiit resorting to
machine code. Diary is a useful program
for making sure you don't book a table at
the local go^hi bar when you'll miss
HastEnders.

MODE 3*

Mode 3 is a two-scroen, four colour, Mode
0 th#i lets you have d^a on the
background screen which you can't see,
but which is nevertheless there. Very fast
animatbn can be created by flipping
instantly from the foreground to the
background screen. January ^$$$.

ANIMATOR*

Anjmaitor is a wira frame drawing suite of
programs that allows you to put togethar
a number of key frames, and the software
will 'tween' them to produce b finished
cartoon. April 1936.

TRACE*

The TROfvl and TROFF commands ere very
useful for debugging basic programs, but
they often make a mess of the screen.

This routine allows you to re-direct the
trace to a screen window or printer.
December 1985.

CHORD FINDER*

This program can display over 2,000
chords, and up to 36 chord shapes can be
SBved to tape of disc and loaded when
required. September 1385.

JET SET WILLY HACK*

Infinite lives and a magic teleport help you
trip around miner Willy's mansion. Note

culled from the issues of Amstrad Computer User.

These clever programs cover animation, business, music,
games hacks and much more. Whatever your interest, there
is something here for you - and at a very special price.

ncu " * ■■

Ikj- -A '

tsl t. 1 t

£4 r nr k-k-tiSJ-C-fc.

that this hack will only work with The Final
Frontier version and not with the versions
of the game that appeared on a
compilation. September 13S5.

DOUBLE HEIGHT PRINT^

A useful routine for enlarging letters on
the screen. So if you are a tall type, then
letters help you to expand your horizons.
1$S5.

ELITE DISC HACK

So you have been playing Elite for a while
and are still mostly harmless. If you want
millions of credits, a few bolt-on goodies
or even the hollowed Elite status, then
ZZKJ's program can provide it- Instantly.

JUSTIN'S SCROLL*

If you look in wonder at arcade games in
which spaceships whizz over a planet's
surface at on# million miles per hour and
wish that you could write a program to do
that, then you need Justin's ScrDll. Peter
Green adapted this program for the
scrolling rn Rimrunner, and tho Zsit
Corporation found it came in useful for
BMX Kidz. This is how the profess!on bIs
do it. Jyne 1987.

RSX USTER

Most utility roms contain an FlSX lister,
but they only list those RSXs that are in
Fom. What about those that have been
soft loaded? With this routine you can
revaal a^/the RSXs hidden In your ram.

In some cases you will need to refer
to the issue of ACU in which the
programs appeared. In the list above
these are shown by * followed by
the month. If you do not have these
issues, you can send for the Utilities
Unhmited documentation pack at the
special price of £4.55.

PRINTER SPOOLER

When you print out a file from disc Arnold
spends ell his time printing. With 3 posh
cornpuler, like the PC, this kind of lob can
be done In the background enabling you
to carry on using the computer while the
printer is working. With Printer Spooler
your humble CPC can do the very same
thing. It's just like having two computers.

EPSON DUMP

A dump for Epson compstible printers^
ideal for taking hard copies of Mode 1 or
Mode 2 screens, or parts thereof. Works
with the DMPlOOOr DMP216(1', or any other
similar printer,, but not with the DM PI.

THE NOBLE ORGAN

Turn your computer into a different kind
of keyboard - a musical one. OK the CPC
is no Fairlight, but the AV-S-SIZ can sound
pretty impressive if you have light enough
fingers.

ZX LOADER*

A routine, that will allow you to read in
Spectrum binary files. This will Wof let you
play Spectrum games on your CPC, hut it
is ideal for transferring data and graphics
b^twt^en two otherwise incompatibliS
computers. Jaiy 1986.

Tape i

E7.95

Disc £9.95

Documentation £4.95

To order please use
the order form on
Page 73

All these

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PLUS a smart ACU binder to keep
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That comes to a massive saving of
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ACUS

ASTROLOGY for beginners

Teach yourself astrology using your Amstrad

Buy a Starter Pack compriaiTig a simple program to calculate a
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For ALL Anutrads (CPC, PCW, PC, PPC)

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Also ICHING, GRAPHOLOGY, BIORHYTHMS, etc.

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Herts HP3 SER England. Tel: 0442 51809 '

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EDUCATIONAL
SOFTWARE
SPECIAUSTS

PRE-SCHOOL

PRIMARY

JUNIOR

Devised by experienced teachers
Tested in Classroom and Home
Parenl/Teacher notes supplied with all sets

WIDE CHOICE OF PROGRAMS FOR
AMSTRAD 464,664,6128, PCI 512. ATARI ST

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GALEPER SOFT

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ic Inolydea a TAPE^TO-DISC COPER to iranslergaines on tape on to

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A Adds- over 60 new coninia.rid& to Basic) So iisar-frjefidly. A joy I

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JACKSON COMPUTERS LIMITED

JOIN OUR DISCOUNT CLUB!

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Pegs 74

Amstrad User Msrch (989

tti.<

1 s t

J-Xl

firoiri SW^ ^^*3?

Swift Software is a new.force in top
quality, low cost software. Due to
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prices. In return we pass these
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As part of a special promotion we
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Remeiidber/ these prices can only be
helcf this low for a limited period,
so send in your order today I

mil Irtv+rt HI craatad Protairt, PFoaarga ?liii asd a Citiziit Orartitira |ll< laiar pziatar

Protext ttithaut doubt th*

■ophii.tici mtttd procttior

you.'n jlod on my bomw aiero. It*
**■• o£ UMB and. *dra.DO«4 raagfr of
foBturoa mrm normally o-Dly found La
iymtvPi eottin-g n-Bny
tiiiBi Bor*. Prc^tBxt !■ th*
iLUBbBF on* word procoiaor fo-r th*
CPCl

* iKtr* fBBt;

* iforlci vltti any priatmT

- Flaxibl* find biliI r^plBco
^ CoBplBt* ooDtroI ov«£ pig* IflyCut
■ Hot a eouDt

* HiiDy pi^iat optioDi i

Rf? Di*c iifi.sa rob

0«r Price nJ,iO iU.Sit

* jfficTPrpaeiflf

* rypBwritmt nod*

H Link fil** at priat tiao
■ ka-far Bat whil« print lag
HIP bias 134,is

Oiir Price

To-u tavB

E19.50

|i. 4i

SR?

Chang■ rvgiatB^ contaiLti
kaauH from brkkkpointi
L 4 kd/iav* Hchia# hoOB diirictly
Ban? hbv atiBBblar dlrBctiva*
All othar faatarai rotainad

IDB

Our Price

You IBWB

you

E ?*4S

E10 .Ik

Promerge Plus ffciia ram

of far ■ all tha faatuna of tba
FroBarga -diac pIuBh anong ottar
faatarta»

■ Two file aditing

* background pri-Qtiag

* dou/eoLLLBn Ttoda

Our Price E24.ill

Prospell - with ?ro*p*ll you

can produca 100 par cant arrO?-
fraa documanti , alimiDating odd
word! and d-uhioua Bpallihgi - You cao
alao add wurda tc craatB your dVD
dictionary.

* Can chack Protasl: taxt ia Baaory

■ Hark* with Taamord^ Aaaword^ aad
Hordatkr

* Ovar 33,000 word dioticvnary

* ChachB at up to 3,404 morda par
■ iuiiti

■ Find! wcrda aad anagrani

SHF DiliE 12*. 9b ^34.-9 5

fad aava

ElO.iS

Haxam - Tha atasdard kBaaoihlar/

Wositor/lditor fOE da?iloping !i4
aiohiod coda, giad by many top

■ ofivara h-PELk-aa^ thia i* an aaaantial
utility if you want to craat-a machina
cod-a prograniE.

« Plain ingliih arrec Hsiigaa
« Piaaaaanblar

* JtamdEy aditor

* Poll loraan progma aditoE

■ Kix 8aale and nachina coda

D.AF Disc 136 pSS HD* E3?pi4

BCPL w Qf tha fattait, moat

fliKibla progriKBlng languagai for
thi CPC^ Jt ii tha pradurtor to C ind
haa baan uaad to vrita vany opaEating
lyatafli and othar major prograBB
whar« ipaad la aaamotial*

* Comp r aha Hi iw a I/Cl librariaa

* Craata your own funutio-n libraEiaB

* tull control ot .^Eophlci and tound
± ixanpla aourca f^l«a

* {D pagB fflanual

* Full ai^rB-BD adltoir and apaca InvB-
dar gam* auppliad

klLP Diac £34.-951 ROB $29.^b

Qui Price 419.^0 E22.9I}

tT.*i

Toe aava

ts.is

inatallad
how you
ft giTaa you
all ot vhich *ra
having to writa

Our Price

Ton IBFa

(18.50

£«.45

(24.50

114.41

Our Price

Ton iBva

il9.50

il,*b

(29.50

tlQ .45

Pr’OmfiE'Q^ -PEomarga iv nora than
jiaat a ainpla aallBargar lor
atandard lattara.. it includai

? aBmrfuL aathamatioal find taxt

unotioha and. of coura m, ifttagratan
parfictly with PEotaxt,

4 kaad data from kiyboard or fill
• CondlttaDAl printing

Maxam 1*5 - InhBftdad van:ion of

tha axtiapaly BLiocaiiCul aiapahLaE/
monitor, daaiguBd to ba uaad fro*

Protaxt. Tha aditor baa
baan raBcvad, laaving If oca:

nav lanturHa.

* AiiaBhl* IroB mithift Protaxt
-i Comprahana iva diagnoatida

tharafor*
for Bany

Utopia - Oftta you hav

Utopia you won't know
aanagad without iti ft
5 0 nav c-ouBandi -
availabla without

q aingla prograa.

^ Taxi and graphic! Bcraaft duBpa
-i Qi*c utilitink - foraat, oopFr
■actor aditor aud mUdh Bcrai

* hutonatioalLy lat fundtian kayi

p Virtually ij 0 li*itad funotlOft kay
■ pmea

* 9aBid progranBing utilitiaa

* koB managauat coBBandv

4 iB ■ y ao c n ■ ! to k 18 a n.d I kA oA * 4 & 4

IBP Sob Eli.95

Oor Price

Tot^ aava

(22.5D

f T.41

Tint-

s nev^JT t>eeri 4
cret into iroin

s of twA :

ar way to

o 1

Rombo 4 Protext startup kit - The
Rombo is a sturdy box which can hold
up to eight roms. And if you run out
of room, you can simply add another.
It comes with a cover, so you can
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* On/off switch for each rom

* In and out expansion port sockets

RRP

Our Price
You save

£74.90

£49.50

£25.40

ORDER.

FXaasA sorrdL m9

foXXow±n^

L X

Disc

Rom

& Romtjio

—

£49^30

f X 4.3D

£ S 9 ^ SO

[

£ 1 » « 3D

[

—

ps x X
tJ tofsi-ok

£ a 4 - 50

[

]

£ X a , 3D

£ J2 4 « 3 O

—

£23.30

MancKTR

E X 9 - 3D

£ a 9 HP 3 G

[

]

Mascam X . S

£ 2 a .4 3d

BCPL^

£ 1e- 3D

£ a S - SD

[

]

FORM

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SlflFT SOFTWARE, ROOM 3, 347 LONDON ROAD, HAZEL GROVE, STOCKPORT, SK7 6AA

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lateVwkir

LAST NINJA V

;RE PLACES 1

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FRi^CiATOR V{>u'vf hE'i3rcj i^tiiPpMtJtiar^the-
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epr .^r, Ont-Hch.?.

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